Universal Constants, Standard Models and Fundamental Metrology

Taking into account four universal constants, namely the Planck's constant $h$, the velocity of light $c$, the constant of gravitation $G$ and the Boltzmann's constant $k$ leads to structuring theoretical physics in terms of three theories each taking into account a pair of constants: the quantum theory of fields ($h$ and $c$), the general theory of relativity ($c$ and $G$) and quantum statistics ($h$ and $k$). These three theories are not yet unified but, together, they underlie the standard models that allow a satisfactory phenomenological description of all experimental or observational data, in particle physics and in cosmology and they provide, through the modern interpretation of quantum physics, fundamental metrology with a reliable theoretical basis

Inspection System for Benchmarking of Perceived and Technical Characteristics of Surfaces

Haptic perception of texture is an important tool in the evaluation of products such as smartphones, automobiles, kitchen appliances etc. Successful companies thus aim at actively designing the haptic impression of their products to the haptic preferences of their customers. However doing so requires information as to how comparable product surfaces are perceived by the customer and how these surfaces can be characterized technically. The perceived haptic impression of an object can be estimated using human studies, whereas its technical characteristics can be measured. However, direct correlation between perceived and standard measurements often shows poor significance, thus perceived haptic impression can not be simply derived from standard measurements. It remains to be analysed, if alternative measurements can provide a more significant characterization of surfaces in terms of their perceived haptic impression. To allow a more efficient estimation of the perceived impression of an object, an automatic inspection system is presented. This system consists of a force controlled robot driving a biomimetic sensor by the company Syntouch, providing a vibration signal during traverse over a surface. The paper presents results of a study to correlate the sensor signals to the perceived roughness of different surfaces evaluated by human subjects and set this in comparison to a correlation between standard roughness values and the perceived roughness