Rutherford (unit) Rutherford (unit) The rutherford (symbol Rd) is a non-SI unit of radioactive decay. It is defined as the activity of a quantity of radioactive material in which one million nuclei decay per second. It is therefore equivalent to one megabecquerel, and one becquerel equals one microrutherford. One rutherford is equivalent to 2.703 × 10 curie. The unit was introduced in 1946. It was named after British/New Zealand physicist and Nobel laureate Lord Ernest Rutherford (Nobel Prize in 1908), who was an early leader in the study of atomic nucleus disintegrations. After the becquerel was introduced in 1975 as the SI
Astronomical unit expanding outward from the Sun. This has led to calls to abandon the astronomical unit as a unit of measurement. As the speed of light has an exact defined value in SI units and the Gaussian gravitational constant "k" is fixed in the astronomical system of units, measuring the light time per unit distance is exactly equivalent to measuring the product "G" in SI units. Hence, it is possible to construct ephemerides entirely in SI units, which is increasingly becoming the norm. A 2004 analysis of radiometric measurements in the inner Solar System suggested that the secular increase in the