Round 4: Tossup 1

This unit is the most common unit used to express the front-to-back ratio of an antenna. A meteorological quantity called this unit relative to Z is a normalized expression (10[1])for the equivalent reflectivity of a hydrometeor. The steepness of a filter’s transfer function is written as the change in this unit per decade or octave, which is a quantity called the roll-off. (10[1])The frequency at which gain drops off by approximately 3 of this unit (10[1])determines the cutoff frequency. In its most common (10[1])application, a reference pressure equal to 20 micropascals defines a value (10[1])of 0 for this unit. This unit is defined so that multiplying intensity by a factor (10[1])of 10 (10[2])corresponds to an increase by 10 (10[1])of (10[1])this unit. For 10 points, name this unit that defines a logarithmic scale of sound intensity. ■END■

ANSWER: decibels [or dB; accept dBZ; accept decibels relative to Z; prompt on answers of dimensionless by asking “what unit are we using here to express these dimensionless quantities?”; prompt on bels or B]
<GC, Physics> | Packet B - Queens A, UCLA B, Edinburgh B, St. Georges A
= Average correct buzzpoint

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