Radio stations
could reach their audiences with a clearer signal after NIST
established a
standard of frequency and began broadcasting precise frequency signals
in 1923. NIST frequency services continue to serve radio and television
stations, power and telephone companies, the
financial community, and others.
Aerospace, medicine,
and manufacturing are among the beneficiaries of NISTs century
of research on cryogenics, a branch of physics dealing with the
production and effects of very low temperatures. For instance, in
1931, NIST produced Americas first liquefied helium,
the coolant later used in magnetic resonance imaging.
Financial services,
telecommunications companies, and hardware and software products
rely heavily on the data encryption standard issued by NIST
in 1977, the first publicly available standard of this type and
the first cryptographic algorithm endorsed by the federal government.
Today, NIST is coordinating the development of a more powerful successor
standard.
The semiconductor
industry has saved millions of dollars annually and improved
product
quality thanks to the increasingly tiny rulers that
NIST provides for measuring the widths of integrated circuit features.
NIST issued its first photomask linewidth standard in 1979 and is
currently developing new measurement approaches, such as direct
counting of atoms.
U.S. companies
compete in a fair marketplace today in part because of NIST,
which convened the first meeting of state weights and measures officials
in 1905. Accuracy and uniformity in weights and measures have improved
considerably over the past century, and NIST continues to support
the National Conference on Weights and Measures.
Small manufacturing
firms gained an important advantage in 1996, when NISTs
Manu-
facturing Extension Partnership reached its goal of completing a
nationwide network, enabling all of the more than 361,000 small
manufacturers in the 50 states and Puerto Rico to gain access to
MEP assistance centers. MEP services have been boosting smaller
companies competitiveness since 1989.
The air conditioning
and refrigeration industry has saved millions of dollars thanks
to a computer standard reference database of the thermophysical
properties of alternative refrigerants (i.e., alternatives to ozone-depleting
compounds), introduced by NIST in 1989. NIST has provided industry
with refrigerant property data for more than 50 years.
The emerging
field of DNA chipsminiaturized laboratories that
quickly analyze the genetic makeup of blood or tissue samples and
are expected to revolutionize medicineis among the new
industries nurtured by NIST funding and research. Other U.S.
industries launched in part with NIST assistance include optical
glass and synthetic rubber.
Companies that
sell bullet-resistant armor to law enforcement agencies and military
forces worldwide rely on NISTs standard for ballistic resistance
of police body armor, one of more than a dozen law enforcement standards
issued by the Institute since the early 1970s. Not a single police
officer wearing body armor made to these specifications has been
killed by penetration or blunt trauma. NIST has been involved
in forensic work since the early 1900s.
Since it began
in 1987, the Malcolm Baldrige National Quality Award program has
helped thousands of organizations improve their overall performance.
In a survey, CEOs said the Baldrige program was extremely or
very valuable in stimulating quality improvements (79 percent)
and competitiveness (67 percent). The Baldrige Criteria for
Performance Excellence has been called the single most influential
document in the modern history of American business.
The once-troubled
$7 billion U.S. printed wiring board industry, with its 200,000
jobs, was saved by a research project co-funded by NISTs
Advanced Technology Program. According to a 1997 study, the joint
venture led to dramatic efficiencies in research and development,
accelerated research, and produced significant technological advances.
In 1999, over
23,000 firms took advantage of NISTs Manufacturing Extension
Partnership (MEP) services. In a survey of MEP clients served in
the last three quarters of FY 1999, 2,942 companies reported that,
as a result of NIST MEP services, they increased or retained
$1.4 billion in sales, realized $364 million in cost savings, and
created or retained 18,153 jobs.
Date created:
2/9/01
Last updated: 2/9/01
Contact: inquiries@nist.gov
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