ABSTRACT
This chapter describes the National Bureau of Standards’ Measurement of the Universal Gas Constant Using an Acoustic Resonator, relating the context in which the publication appeared, its impact on science, technology, and the general public, and brief details about the lives and work of the author. The 1988 measurement of the universal gas constant at NIST was stimulated by an error made at a rival national metrology institute, Great Britain's National Physical Laboratory (NPL). In order to place the 1988 measurement of gas constant in context, the chapter also describes the role that gas constant plays in temperature metrology, the connection between gas constant and the speed of sound, and the remarkable symmetry that made the accurate acoustic measurement of gas constant possible. Then, to convey the flavor of the metrology, it describes the measurement of the resonator's volume. The chapter concludes with a few remarks concerning acoustic thermometry.
