Scientists all over the world are working hard to make better atomic clocks. When they succeed, the new atomic clocks will help us better understand how our world works. One of the things they will be used for is deep-space communications. Jun Ye and other scientists at JILA are working hard to win a race to make the best atomic clock in the world.

Ye’s clock uses laser light to make a cloud of extremely cold strontium atoms produce very fast, very exact ticks. Inside the clock, magic light holds the atoms very still while the laser shines on them, getting them to make ticks without disturbing them in any other way.

The new clock uses another laser to count the ticks. It has to use a laser because its ticks are too fast to count any other way. The laser that counts the ticks also works like a gear. It slows down the ticks enough so that the time can appear on a clock display.

When Jun Ye and his team are finished making the best atomic clock they can, it could eventually be a hundred times better than the cesium primary clock located at the National Institute of Standards and Technology!—Julie Phillips

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