Temperature scientists measure temperature using the Celsius scale and thermodynamic temperature using the Kelvin scale, which is the Celsius scale offset so that its null point is = , or absolute zero. Many engineering fields in the U.S., notably high-tech and US federal specifications (civil and military), also use the Kelvin and Celsius scales. Other engineering fields in the U.S. also rely upon the Rankine scale (a shifted Fahrenheit scale) when working in thermodynamic-related disciplines such as combustion. The basic unit of temperature in the International System of Units (SI) is the kelvin. It has the symbol K. For everyday applications,
Absolute value geometric interpretation of the absolute value of a real number as its distance from 0 can be generalised. The absolute value of a complex number is defined by the Euclidean distance of its corresponding point in the complex plane from the origin. This can be computed using the Pythagorean theorem: for any complex number where and are real numbers, the absolute value or modulus of is denoted and is defined by where Re("z") = "x" and Im("z") = "y" denote the real and imaginary parts of "z", respectively. When the imaginary part is zero, this coincides with the definition of