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By timing the eclipses of Jupiter's moon Io, Rømer estimated that light would take about 22 minutes to travel a distance equal to the diameter of Earth's orbit around the Sun. [1] Using modern orbits, this would imply a speed of light of 226,663 kilometres per second, [2] 24.4% lower than the true value of 299,792 km/s. [3]
Ole Rømer used an astronomical measurement to make the first quantitative estimate of the speed of light in the year 1676. [94] [95] When measured from Earth, the periods of moons orbiting a distant planet are shorter when the Earth is approaching the planet than when the Earth is receding from it. The difference is small, but the cumulative ...
1690 – Christiaan Huygens gives the first estimate of the speed of light in air or vacuum, based on Rømer’s work. The result is equivalent to about 2×10 8 m/s in modern units, correct only to the order of magnitude .
At 3 times the speed it was again eclipsed. [3] [4] Given the rotational speed of the wheel and the distance between the wheel and the mirror, Fizeau was able to calculate a value of 2 × 8633m × 720 × 25.2/s = 313,274,304 m/s for the speed of light. Fizeau's value for the speed of light was 4.5% too high. [5] The correct value is 299,792,458 ...
In 1845, Arago suggested to Fizeau and Foucault that they attempt to measure the speed of light. Sometime in 1849, however, it appears that the two had a falling out, and they parted ways. [5]: 124 [3] In 1848−49, Fizeau used, not a rotating mirror, but a toothed wheel apparatus to perform an absolute measurement of the speed of light in air.
The Hubble length or Hubble distance is a unit of distance in cosmology, defined as cH −1 — the speed of light multiplied by the Hubble time. It is equivalent to 4,420 million parsecs or 14.4 billion light years. (The numerical value of the Hubble length in light years is, by definition, equal to that of the Hubble time in years.)
The latest report from the California High-Speed Rail Authority projects costs for the initial segment at $35 billion, which exceeds secured funding by $10 billion.
They set a limit on the anisotropy of the speed of light resulting from the Earth's motions of Δc/c ≈ 10 −15, where Δc is the difference between the speed of light in the x- and y-directions. [33] As of 2015, optical and microwave resonator experiments have improved this limit to Δc/c ≈ 10 −18.