quintillion

American  

[kwin-til-yuhn] / kwɪnˈtɪl yən /

noun

plural

quintillions,

plural

quintillion

1. a cardinal number represented in the U.S. by 1 followed by 18 zeros, and in Great Britain by 1 followed by 30 zeros.

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adjective

1. amounting to one quintillion in number.

quintillion British  

/ kwɪnˈtɪljən /

noun

1. US and Canadian word: nonillion.  (in Britain, France, and Germany) the number represented as one followed by 30 zeros (10 ³⁰ )

2. Former Brit word: trillion.  (in the US and Canada) the number represented as one followed by 18 zeros (10 ¹⁸ )

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Other Word Forms

• quintillionth noun

Etymology

Origin of quintillion

1665–75; < Latin quīnt ( us ) fifth + -illion (as in million )

Example Sentences

These exascale machines can perform a quintillion calculations per second and occupy thousands of square feet -- recalling the massive size of the earliest computers.

From Science Daily

Europe recently unveiled a rival, Jupiter, housed in western Germany, also able to perform at least one quintillion calculations per second, which is equivalent to about a million smartphones.

From Barron's

Interplanetary space contains just a few dozen particles in each cubic centimeter — in comparison, the air we breathe has tens of quintillions of molecules per cubic centimeter.

From Salon

They expect future calculations to be performed on ORNL's Frontier, the world's most powerful supercomputer and the first exascale system, which is able to perform more than a quintillion calculations each second.

From Science Daily

There are more than 10 quintillion insects on Earth, 200 million for every human.

From Science Magazine