Partnership for Advanced Measurement Standards: The Calibration Coordination Group (CCG) of the Department of Defense and the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST)

摘要

On the occasion of the one-hundredth anniversary of National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) and the 33rd of the Calibration Coordination Group (CCG) it seemed an appropriate time to tell the story of how this partnership came to exist and to provide some highlights of what has been accomplished over these years. Besides coordinating routine calibrations of military standards for the three services at the NIST laboratories the CCG has sponsored close to 500 technical research projects to develop new standards and measurement methods in anticipation of technological advances. Since NIST also serves as the nation's primary civilian standards agency, the results of these projects quickly found their way into the country's commerce. The results, not always easy to document, have in many cases provided the source for new product development and entrepreneurial startups. In the following pages we have documented some of these engineering projects and their results, not only for archival purposes but also to honor the efforts of the people who had the foresight to recognize the initial problems and generate solutions with far-reaching results.