How long does it take a mercury atom to oscillate?

[shortylickens]

It came up on Night Court.

 

[lakedude]

2.4691358 × 10-11 seconds, for 199?

 

[shortylickens]

Hmmm, a space man visiting Night Court said he would give them 98 billion oscillations of mercury before he vaporized them all.
But that doesnt look like a long time.

 

[SMOGZINN]

Wait, are you talking about the 1980's TV show? I wouldn't use that as an accurate source of information.

 

[Mark R]

Which oscillation and which type of mercury atom?

 

[shortylickens]

Which oscillation and which type of mercury atom?

I dont know the oscillation, and since he didnt specify I would assume standard. Non-ion, non-isotope.

 

[sjwaste]

I thought we were talking about the wobble in the planet's orbit. I need to get out of this forum, stop drinking, or both.

But apparently 199 Hg+ was once used for atomic clocks. And according to Google, the resonance frequency of 199 Hg is 17.827 MHz. So they apparently had about 56 seconds. Stingy alien.

 

[atpokey]

To be fair to aliens, he was actually just a crazy inventor that came up with a fancy gun and silver suit.

 

[lakedude]

I thought we were talking about the wobble in the planet's orbit. I need to get out of this forum, stop drinking, or both.

But apparently 199 Hg+ was once used for atomic clocks. And according to Google, the resonance frequency of 199 Hg is 17.827 MHz. So they apparently had about 56 seconds. Stingy alien.

Hmm, I see where you are getting your figure.

I'm also finding 1.06 10+15 Hz in literature talking about Hg199 being used as an atomic clock and evidently found yet another figure (or made a mistake) when I posted 2.4691358 × 10-11 seconds...

Will the real frequency please stand up?