The Vice President of TÜBİTAK, Prof. Dr. Mehmet Çelik, visited the Saudi Standards, Metrology and Quality Organization (SASO) National Metrology and Calibration Center (NMCC) and the King Abdullah Chair for Crescent Observation and Lunar Research (KACCOLR) Mekkah Time Center (MTC) on October 26-29, 2015 to observe the ongoing projects being undertaken in cooperation with TÜBİTAK UME.
The Acting Director of TÜBİTAK UME, Dr. Mustafa Çetintaş, accompanied Vice President Prof. Dr. Mehmet Çelik on the visit during which meetings were held with the management teams of the Saudi agencies, among whom was SASO President Dr. Saad O. Al Kasabi, as well as the project managers to discusss progress on the projects that were initiated in 2013.
Besides exchanging information on ongoing projects, possible future projects were also discussed.
Additionally, a visit was made to the Mekkah Time Center (MTC) where work on projects undertaken by TÜBİTAK UME was observed and discussions were held on possible new projects KACCOLR MTC Director, Dr. Yaseen M. Almleaky.
The aim of the projects with SASO/NMCC is the turn-key establishment of the scientific metrology infrastructure, consisting of 29 laboratories and sublaboratories in Physics, Electric-Electronics, Mechanics and Chemistry, to be the foundation of the national quality infrastructure required for the elimination of technical barriers to trade. The three seperate projects include supply of equipment, their installation and operation, onsite and offsite training for technical personnel and consultancy, and work to ensure the international traceability of all reference systems to the SI.
Within the year and a half that has passed since the signing of the project contracts, 70% of the systems included in the projects have been delivered and installed at SASO/NMCC.
Within the project that was initiated at KACCOLR MTC in 2013, the utilization of the 11 Cs Atomic Clocks and satellite receivers owned by MTC was significantly developed. The uncertainties of MTC’s contribution to the UTC time scale maintained by the BIPM were lowered from 10 ns to 1 ns for A type uncertainty and from 20 ns to 7 ns for B type uncertainty, bringing them into the top 20 laboratories among the 70 that contribute to UTC.
During the visit at KACCOLR MTC, the possibility of joint research on producing atomic clocks was discussed and information was shared on the satellite based Regional Positining System that is planned for development by TÜBİTAK.
