why does a clinical thermometer have a small range of celsius?

Question

i need to know why a clinical thermometer has a small range of celsius degrees.

Answer 1

To give it more precision, and hopefully more accuracy, in the range in which it will be used.

Answer 2

With a thermometer, there is usually a tradeoff between range and precision- the larger your range, the less precise your values can be. For instance, a standard thermometer with a range of, say, 50 degrees, you usually can't measure it more accurately than to a degree, maybe half a degree.



In a clinical thermometer, the range of temperatures it is used for is quite low- the human body is fixed at around 37 degrees and doesn't go more than about 5 either way or most (or you die). So you don't need a very large range. However, accurate and precise readings are important. So a narrow range with high precision is desirable.

Answer 3

Pegminer has already given an pleasant answer. There are study grade mercury thermometers with zero.1 C divisions. I have 2 or 3 in my lab, and more than 20 of the 1 C per division type. I use thermocouples just about completely now. One among my students broke a thermometer looking to dispose of it from a cork and reduce his palm. The bureaucracy that followed brought about me more soreness than the scholar felt. I'll donate my mercury thermometers to any academic or study institution that asks for them. It is technically possible to learn a mercury thermometer to raised than zero.1 C precision. One process could be to measure the capacitance of the thermometer tube within the size neighborhood. Mercury has a very different dielectric consistent than air, so a metamorphosis within the level of mercury would provide a transformation in capacitance and therefore a transformation in voltage that may be measured with high precision. The mercury degree could also be measured to inside a couple of microns optically with a photograph diode array. Mercury makes a very good reflect. If the thermometer was used as one arm of a Michelson interferometer, the extent of mercury would be measured with a precision of a few nanometers comparable to a change in temperature of possibly 1E-5 k.

Answer 4

all thermometers ( thermo = heat or temperature) are designed of a particular use in a range of temperatures



there is an "absolute scale called kelvin that uses Celsius size degrees but different devices are needed for the practical range



humans are dead + or - 5 C of average

Answer 5

Clinical Thermo meter is to measure body temperature.So it is made to that range it varies on human body.

Answer 6

How high a temperature do you think a clinical themometer will need to take? Is your oven feeling ill?

Answer 7

Any larger range and the patient would be dead, so I guess they aren't needed.