A NEGATIVE CHARGE OF 0.16 BILLION-BILLIONTH OF A COULOMB

"The greatest exactitude of all has been obtained in measurements of the electron. A single electron is almost unimaginably small. Abstracted into a probabalistic packet of wave energy, it is also nearly impossible to visualize (as is the case generally for phenomena in quantum physics) within the conventional cognitive framework of objects moving in three-dimensional space. Yet we know with confidence that it has a negative charge of 0.16 billion-billionth (-1.6 x 10 -19) coulomb and a rest mass of 0.91 billion-billion-billionth (9.1 x 10 -28) gram. From these and other verifiable quantities have been accurately deduced the properties of electric currents, the electromagnetic spectrum, the photoelectric effect and chemical bonding."

Wilson, Edward O. (1994: 53) Consilience: The Unity of Knowledge. Random House, New York.