Terahertz (THz)
10¹² hertz. Infrared radiation lies at tens of terahertz.
1 terahertz = 1,000,000,000,000 hertz (exactly).
About the terahertz
A trillion cycles each second is the scale where electronics meets optics. The terahertz, 10 to the power 12 hertz, takes its base unit from Heinrich Hertz, the physicist who gave conclusive proof that electromagnetic waves exist. The IEC established the name hertz in 1935, and the CGPM adopted it in 1960, replacing cycles per second and its multiples such as kilocycles and megacycles.
Radiation between 0.1 and 10 THz, with wavelengths from 3 mm down to 30 micrometres, lies between microwaves and far infrared. For years this stretch was called the terahertz gap, because practical sources and detectors were hard to build. Today it is used for security screening, spectroscopy and imaging, and has been proposed for fast wireless links. Infrared light spans roughly tens of terahertz, and visible light is about 400 to 790 THz.
Sources: Wikipedia: Hertz; Wikipedia: Terahertz radiation; Wikipedia: Orders of magnitude (frequency)
Terahertz conversion chart
1 terahertz expressed in every other frequency unit:
| Unit | 1 terahertz |
|---|---|
| Hertz | 1,000,000,000,000 |
| Kilohertz | 1,000,000,000 |
| Megahertz | 1,000,000 |
| Gigahertz | 1,000 |
| Revolutions Per Minute | 60,000,000,000,000 |
| Beats Per Minute | 60,000,000,000,000 |
| Millihertz | 1×10¹⁵ |
| Radians Per Second | 6,283,185,307,180 |
| Degrees Per Second | 360,000,000,000,000 |
More Metric (SI) units
- hertz (frequency)
- kilohertz (frequency)
- megahertz (frequency)
- gigahertz (frequency)
- millihertz (frequency)
- revolution per minute (frequency)
- beat per minute (frequency)
- meter (length)
- kilometer (length)
- centimeter (length)
- millimeter (length)
- micrometer (length)
- nanometer (length)
- picometer (length)
- decimeter (length)
- hectometer (length)
Browse all frequency units.