Unit of measurement

Unit of Measurement

A unit of measurement is a definite magnitude of a quantity, defined and adopted by convention or by law, that is used as a standard for measurement of the same kind of quantity. Any other quantity of that kind can be expressed as a multiple of the unit of measurement.

History

The use of units of measurement have played a crucial role in human endeavour from early ages up to the present. A multitude of systems of units used to be very common. Now there is a global standard, the International System of Units (SI), the modern form of the metric system.

Systems of Units

There are seven base units in the SI system: the metre, kilogram, second, ampere, kelvin, mole, and candela. They form a set of mutually independent dimensions as required by dimensional analysis commonly employed in science and engineering.

Conversion of Units

Conversion of units involves comparison of different standard physical values, either of a single physical quantity or of a physical quantity and a combination of other physical quantities.

See Also

• International System of Units
• Imperial units
• United States customary units
• Conversion of units
• Orders of magnitude (units)

External Links

• BIPM - measurement units
• NIST - SI units

Unit of measurement Resources
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