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| CATEGORIES ABOUT TORR | |
| non-si metric units | |
| units of pressure | |
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The torr (symbol: Torr) or Millimetre of Mercury ('''mmHg''') is a non- SI unit of Pressure . It is the pressure that supports a column of mercury 1 millimetre high. The unit is named after Evangelista Torricelli , Italian physicist and mathematician, for his discovery of the principle of the Barometer in 1643 . One way to define pressure is in terms of the height of a column of fluid that may be supported by that pressure; or the height of a column of fluid that exerts that pressure at its base. Although a manometer may use any fluid in principle, common fluids like water give heights that cannot be contained in a normal room. A water column needs to be of the order of 10 metres high to exert 1 atmosphere of pressure. Therefore a very dense fluid is required — mercury. Normal atmospheric pressure can support around 760 mm (30 in) of mercury; hence 1/760 of an atmosphere, or 1 mm of mercury (mmHg), has been a convenient measure of pressure for a long time, and is sometimes also called a torr. Because the Standard Atmosphere has been precisely defined (10th CGPM , 1954 ), and the standard atmosphere had previously been defined as 760 mmHg exactly, those two definitions are now combined to define the torr as exactly 101325/760 ≈ 133.3223684 Pascal s. Although the pascal is now the more commonly used unit of pressure, the torr is still used in High Vacuum engineering, particularly where pressures are low enough that Viscosity is absent. The torr, usually under the ''millimeter of mercury'' name, remains a common unit for the measurement of Gas and Blood Pressure in much of the world. mmHg is also used in the United Kingdom as a measure of Intraocular Pressure (IOP) within the eye, especially in patients who suffer from Glaucoma . Anything between 12 mmHg and 22 mmHg is considered normal. Although they are synonyms in practice, the torr and millimeter of mercury are very slightly different by virtue of their definitions in British Standard BS 2520.[http://www.sizes.com/units/mmHg.htm sizes.com, "conventional millimeters of mercury"], retrieved 17 Aug 2007 National Physical Laboratory, "Pressure Units" , retrieved 17 Aug 2007 While the torr is defined as given above, the millimeter of mercury (called the "conventional millimeter of mercury") is defined by the of about 0.14 μPa/Pa (i.e., 0.000014 %). Such a small difference is utterly negligible in most practical applications. SEE ALSO REFERENCES EXTERNAL LINKS |
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