Progress Report on the Cooperation Between NMIJ and PTB on Zinc Point Cells

Abstract

The National Metrology Institute of Japan (NMIJ) and Physikalisch-Technische Bundesanstalt (PTB) have agreed to conduct a collaborative study on zinc point cells. An open-type zinc cell was prepared to act as a transfer cell in this collaboration, and cells were prepared for both institutes to perform experiments using a common cell during the collaboration. The experiments reflect concerns that both institutes have been studying independently over the past several years using an open-type cell. The concerns include the impurity effect, stability of the realized temperature, and the difference in the heat flux due to a change in the filling gas. A part of the zinc sample extracted during the fabrication of this cell was analyzed, and for the purpose of confirmation, the initial sample taken from the same lot as that used in the transfer cell was also analyzed. The stability of the transfer was evaluated from cell comparisons performed by NMIJ before and after the air transportation between PTB and NMIJ. PTB and NMIJ demonstrated an increase in temperature at the zinc point due to a change in the filling gas from argon to helium. The improvement using helium gas was found strongly to depend on the construction of the cell and the fixed-point furnace design. The analysis of the zinc sample confirmed a strong inhomogeneity of Pb and a contamination by some elements. Careful analysis for estimating the impurity effect on the temperature realized using the transfer cell was also conducted based on the latest studies to avoid an improper application of fixed-point correction.