Convert Light Years (ly) to Picometres (pm)

The light year is a unit of length in the Astronomical system of units. It uses the symbol ly.

Often confused with a unit of time as it contains the word "year", it is actually defined by the International Astronomical Union (IAU) as the amount of distance that light travels in a vacuum in one Julian year (365.25 days).

Using the speed of light (299,792,458 m/s or 'c') and the Julian year (as apposed to the Gregorian year which is 365.2425 days), we can equivalate 1 light year as 9,460,730,472,580,800 metres or ≈ 9.46 trillion kilometres.

The picometre is a unit of length and is a multiple of the SI unit metre. It uses the symbol pm.

It represents one trillionth of a metre, or one hundredth of an Ångström.

Because the picometre is so small, its use is restricted almost entirely to chemistry, quantum physics and particle physics. Atoms are typically 62 pm and 520 pm.

LISA (Laser Interferometer Space Antenna) is a probe planned for launch in 2034 to detect gravitational waves in space. Its measures these displacements with an accuracy of up to 20 pm over a distance of 2,500,000,000 m.