Staff members inspect computer hardware at Gannan Data Lake with a total storage capacity of 150PB (petabytes) , in Ganzhou, Jiangxi Province of China. The ever-increasing data generated by servers prompted an increase in prefixes for large measurements.
工作人员在位于中国江西省赣州的总存储容量为150PB（PB）的赣南数据湖检查计算机硬件。服务器生成的不断增长的数据促使大型测量的前置代号增加。
It's about to get eaSIer for people to communicate about really big and really tiny numbers. The prefixes ronto, quecto, ronna and quetta are joining the likes of kilo, tera, mega and many other existing terms in the metric system of measurement. These new prefixes are the first expansions since 1991.
对于人们来说，交流非常大的数字和非常小的数字将变得更加容易。前置代号ronto, quecto, ronna和quetta加入了kilo, tera, mega和许多其他现存的公制计量术语的行列。这些新前置代号是自1991年以来的首次扩展。
The shift in the International System of Units (SI) was finalized at a vote Nov. 18, 2022, at the General Conference on Weights and Measures. Scientists deemed it necessary because scientific advancements are rapidly approaching the limits of how we can refer to huge and small numbers. The internet is a major reason for this, as the growing amount of data on servers worldwide is set to exceed existing numbers in the next few years. This means that there needs to be a standard unit of measurement in place, so that scientific communication doesn't get all discombobulated.
国际单位制(SI)的转变是在2022年11月18日的度量衡大会上通过投票确定的。科学家们认为这是必要的，因为科学的进步正在迅速接近我们如何引用巨大和小数字的极限。互联网是造成这一现象的主要原因，因为在未来几年，全球服务器上的数据量将不断增长，超过现有的数量。这意味着需要有一个标准的测量单位，这样科学交流才不会变得混乱。
At the same time, advancements in radio astronomy, such as measuring the radiation left over from the Big Bang 13.8 billion years ago, have revealed a need to label exceedingly tiny numbers. Current measurement standards simply can't go that small without adding a bunch of filler jargon, "like one thousand-thousandth of" a given unit. Hence the need for these new prefixes.
与此同时，射电天文学的进步，如测量138亿年前大爆炸遗留下来的辐射，揭示了需要标记极其微小的数字。当前的测量标准如果不添加一堆填充术语，“就像千分之一”给定单位，是不可能达到这么小的程度的。因此需要这些新的前置代号。
What Are Ronnas, Quettas, Rontos and Quectos?Ronnas, Quettas, Rontos和Quectos是什么?
The new prefixes for extra large numbers are ronna and quetta. Before these were approved, yotta was the largest prefix and equaled a number 1 followed by 24 zeros (that's 10 to the 24th power or 1024).
特大数字的新前置代号是ronna和quetta。在这些被批准之前，yotta是最大的前置代号，等于数字1后面跟着24个0(即10的24次方或1024)。
- Ronna, by comparison, is a number 1 plus 27 zeros: 1,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 or 1027).
相比之下，Ronna是数字1加27个0:1,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000或1027)。
- Quetta dwarfs ronna, however, as that prefix is equivalent to a whopping 30 zeros (10 30).
然而，Quetta让ronna相形见绌，因为这个前缀相当于30个惊人的0(10 30)。
For contrast, the kilo is only 10 3. The giga is 109, the tera is 1012 and the peta is 1015.
Super-small numbers have two similar, yet unique prefixes.
相比之下，一公斤只有10公斤。giga是109 tera是1012 peta是1015。
超小数字有两个相似但唯一的前缀。
- Ronto is equivalent to 10 to the negative 27th power or 10-27.
Rron等于10的-27次方或10-27。
- Quecto is even tinier, at 10 to the negative 30th power (10-30).
Quecto甚至更小，只有10的-30次方(10-30)。
Before they hit the scene, yocto was the smallest expression, at 10 to the negative 24th power or 10 -24. Other small measurements are the centi (10-3), the nano (10-9) and the pico (10-12).
在他们出现在之前，yocto是最小的表达式，为10的-24次方或10 -24。其他小的测量单位是厘(10-3)、纳(10-9)和皮(10-12)。
Why Were These New Measurements Added?为什么要增加这些新的测量方法?
Scientists already had a need to discuss such large and small numbers but lacked the official terminology to do it with. So, many of them made up their own terms, like "hella" and "bronto," but this can get pretty confusing. When those terms started to hit the mainstream media, the powers-that-be at SI decided to make some tweaks. They couldn't just use the terms that were already in casual use, however, as metric prefixes are always shortened to be only the first letter (K for kilo, for example). Measurement terms starting with H and B were already spoken for, so that's why hella and bronto couldn't be considered candidates.
科学家们已经有必要讨论如此大或如此小的数字，但缺乏官方术语来做这件事。所以，他们中的许多人创造了自己的术语，比如“hella”和“bronto”，但这可能会让人很困惑。当这些术语开始冲击主流媒体时，SI的高层决定做一些调整。然而，他们不能只使用已经在日常使用中的术语，因为公制前置代号总是被缩短为只有第一个字母(例如，K代表kilo)。以H和B开头的计量术语已经被讨论过了，所以这就是为什么hella和bronto不能被考虑为候选者。
"The only letters that were not used for other units or other symbols were R and Q," said Richard Brown, head of metrology at the U.K.'s National Physical Laboratory, according to a ScienceAlert article. Brown helped to draft the proposal for the new numbers. "The middle of the words are very, very loosely based on the Greek and Latin for 9 and 10." Also part of the naming conventions: Smaller measurement prefixes always end in O, and larger ones finish off with an A.
“唯一没有被用于其他单位或符号的字母是R和Q，”英国计量部负责人理查德·布朗(Richard Brown)说据ScienceAlert的一篇文章称，美国国家物理实验室。布朗帮助起草了新数字的提案。“中间的单词非常非常松散地基于希腊语和拉丁语中的9和10。”这也是命名约定的一部分:较小的度量前置代号总是以O结尾，较大的前置代号以A结尾。
Brown added that additional larger and smaller numbers should not be necessary for 20 to 25 more years, when it's likely that science will continue to break barriers, once again.
布朗补充说，在未来的20到25年里，更多或更少的数字应该是没有必要的，届时科学很可能会继续打破障碍，再一次。
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