At the 27th General Conference on Weights and Measures (GCWM) in Paris, France, four new prefixes were added to the international system of units and took effect immediately, NPR reported.
This is the first time since 1991 that the international system of units has been changed.
The four new prefixes are ronna, quetta, ronto and quecto.
Among them, ronna indicates a number followed by 27 zeros, and quetta indicates a number followed by 30 zeros.
ronto and quecto, on the other hand, are used to indicate very small numbers, with 27 and 30 zeros after the decimal point, respectively.
The new prefixes mean that the Earth can be represented as weighing about 6 ronna grams (ronnagrams), while an electron weighs about 1 ronto gram (rontogram).
Scientists say that data science and digital storage have evolved to the point where the maximum counting units available in the International System of Units are used.
Therefore it is very necessary to introduce new very large units prefix rona and quetta (abbreviated as R and Q, respectively).
The new prefixes ronto and quecto (abbreviated as r and q, respectively), which represent very small numbers, will meet the needs of research in quantum science and particle physics.
