Navigation & Timekeeping · Projected milestone
Working nuclear clocks
Estimated year~2035
40% by 2040 · including earlier years
The year is an editorial timing estimate. The percentage applies to occurrence by the stated deadline. These estimates are not calibrated odds.
Thorium nuclear clocks keep time far beyond today's best atomic clocks.
Explore this milestone on the interactive mapWhat the forecast means
Milestone stage: milestone (legacy definition)
Completion criteria: Legacy milestone: refine the observable threshold before resolving.
This page describes a forecast, rather than an achieved result. Read the methodology and assumptions.
Built on
Led to
- Nuclear clocks in orbitForecast · ~2048enables
- Atom-interferometer wave detectorsForecast · ~2055enables
- Second redefined on nuclear clocksForecast · ~2056enables
- Dark matter identifiedForecast · ~2058enables
- Quantum-limited measurementForecast · ~2058enables
- Nuclear-state computingForecast · ~2098enables
Sources & evidence
No individual source links are recorded for this milestone. Source coverage and review status vary across the atlas.
Dataset updated 2026-10-18. This individual record has not been separately re-reviewed.