| Description | Agreed the following recommendation to be put to the Council of the Royal Society;
' That the following memorandum be communicated to the Joint Committee on Standards, Units and Constants of Radioactivity at the forthcoming meeting in Paris on 17 July 1950.
The British National Committee for Physics has been asked by various individuals to consider whether it recommends the adoption of the Barn as a recognised unit of nuclear cross section. The Barn is defined as a cross section of ten to the minus 24 square centimetres, and is named after the Barn door - a large cross section, or something very easy to hit.
The Committe has obtained the opinions of several nuclear physicists in this country; most are of the opinion that, though the term is useful at the moment and commonly employed among nuclear physicists in America and England, it does not, as yet, have the status which would warrant its consideration as a permanent unit worthy of international acceptance. ' |