Thoughts on a changing SI

Abstract

The trend towards an International System of Units (SI) based on fundamental constants has been confirmed and recent actions could result in the redefinition of the four units still necessary to cover all the quantities of interest for physics and chemistry. In this paper some issues whose solution is becoming critical with the approach of the General Conference on Weights and Measures (CGPM) of 2011 are discussed. The traditional kinds of definition and the new proposals are considered on the basis of their mathematical expressions and the advantageous features of the most advanced proposal are pointed out. The problem of choosing the set of fundamental constants to be adopted as reference quantities for the SI units is addressed and a general rule for verifying that the set is sufficient and non-redundant is pointed out in the form of a linear system giving also expressions of all the units as functions of the reference constants. A partial application to the most important units and different sets of constants offers some comparative criteria and shows the advantages of a set including both h and m e . A general condition to be fulfilled by an experiment in order to realize an SI unit is given and a procedure suitable to optimize the availability of the best relization on a global basis is outlined. Finally, the dissemination process is analysed to show that the implied comparisons of standards at any level are not affected by the realization uncertainty, so that the process can be continued with the same standards, independently of any change in the basic reference quantities of the unit system.

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