A decimeter is a metric unit of length equal to one-tenth of a meter. The length of a meter has changed over time, initially based on the distance between the Earth’s equator and North Pole. The metric system was created to easily use decimals, unlike other systems like the American standard. The length of a meter and decimeter has been revised several times, with the current definition based on the speed of light.
A decimeter is a measure of length based on the metric scale of measurements and equals one tenth of a meter. The exact length of a meter has changed over time and was initially based on the distance between the Earth’s equator and the North Pole. Since the 1960s, however, the length of a meter has been based on light, with initial measurements using the wavelength of a particular element and more recent measurements based on the speed of light. A decimeter therefore can vary in length depending on the standard used, but in relation to other measurements in the metric system it remains the same.
The metric system, in which measurements such as the meter and decimeter can be found, is based on the idea of creating a system of measurements that can easily use decimals. Other systems of measurement, such as the American standard of feet and inches, don’t always decompose using a tens or hundreds system. The inch is one twelfth of a foot, for example, and other measurements are often based on a half inch, a quarter inch, and another halving of the distance. Metric measurements were developed to create a standard that could be easily divided and multiplied further using a base-ten approach, using prefixes such as “deci-” and “centi-” to denote a tenth and a hundredth.
The initial measurements used to establish the length of one metre, on which the decimetre is based, were based on the distance from the Earth’s equator to the North Pole. In 1790 a team of scientists was tasked with determining this distance to be used to establish the length of one meter. Once this measurement was obtained, the total length was used to establish the length of one meter as one ten-millionth of this distance. The shape of the Earth is not a perfect geometric shape, however, and so this distance has not been calculated perfectly and the actual circumference of the Earth is just over 40 million meters (over 131 million feet).
Since these first measurements, the length of a meter and related measures such as the decimetre have been revised several times. The first major change occurred in 1960 when the length of a meter was defined based on the wavelength of light from a krypton-86 atom. Due to some variables which can cause imperfections in the measurement of the wavelengths of light, however, this was changed again in 1983 to determine the length of one meter and one decimeter based on the speed of light. The official length of a meter since 1983 is the distance traveled by light in 1/299,792,458 of a second in vacuum; a decimeter is therefore a tenth of this length.
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