picocoulombs
pee-koh-KOO-lohmz
Definition
A unit of electric charge equal to one trillionth (10^-12) of a coulomb, used in this article to quantify the specific electrical response generated per unit of force in diamond membranes.
Etymology
The term combines the prefix 'pico-' (from the Italian 'piccolo,' meaning small) with 'coulomb,' named after the French physicist Charles-Augustin de Coulomb, who established the laws of electrostatic attraction.
In the news
The article uses this unit to measure the piezoelectric coefficient (d33) of the polycrystalline diamond, showing that even tiny, trillionth-scale charges can indicate measurable electrical activity.
Diamond was classed as non-piezoelectric for more than a century—but HKU researchers have now bent ultrathin polycrystalline diamond membranes and generated stable, repeatable voltages, revealing an electrical response created by symmetry-breaking
Read the full article ↗ScienceBlog.com