Orders of magnitude (time)
| 10−12 | 1 picosecond | ps | One trillionth of one second | 1 ps: mean lifetime of a bottom quark; light travels 0.3 millimeters (mm) 1 ps: typical lifetime of a transition state 4 ps: Time to execute one machine cycle by an IBM silicon-germanium transistor 109 ps: Period of the photon corresponding to the hyperfine transition of the ground state of cesium-133, and one 9,192,631,770th of one second by definition 114.6 ps: Time for the fastest overclocked processor As of 2014 to execute one machine cycle.[9] |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 10−9 | 1 nanosecond | ns | One billionth of one second | 1 ns: Time to execute one machine cycle by a 1 GHz microprocessor 1 ns: Light travels 30 cm (12 in) |
| 10−6 | 1 microsecond | µs | One millionth of one second | 1 µs: Time to execute one machine cycle by an Intel 80186 microprocessor 2.2 µs: Lifetime of a muon 4–16 µs: Time to execute one machine cycle by a 1960s minicomputer |
| 10−3 | 1 millisecond | ms | One thousandth of one second | 1 ms: time for a neuron in human brain to fire one impulse and return to rest[10] 4–8 ms: typical seek time for a computer hard disk |
| 10−2 | 1 centisecond | cs | One hundredth of one second | 1–2 cs (=0.01–0.02 s): Human reflex response to visual stimuli 1.6667 cs period of a frame at a frame rate of 60 Hz. 2 cs: cycle time for European 50 Hz AC electricity |
| 10−1 | 1 decisecond | ds | One tenth of a second | 1–4 ds (=0.1–0.4 s): Blink of an eye[1 |
Multiples Unit Symbol
6×101 seconds 1 minute m
6×101 minutes 1 hourh (hr) h
2.4×101 hours 1 day d