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hu [Chinese]

This entry treats two different Chinese units that, without diacritics, are both romanized as hu.

1

hū 忽 In China, a character representing one hundred thousandth. For example:

hūkè 忽克 a unit of mass = one hundred thousandth of a gram: 1 hūkè = 0.00001 gram = 10 micrograms.
hūmǐ 忽米 a unit of length = one hundred thousandth of a meter: 1 hūmǐ = 0.00001 meter = 10 micrometers.

The sequence of SI prefixes does not include a prefix meaning one hundred thousandth. In the course of adopting metric measures, to accomodate the hū the Chinese chose to refer to the hūmǐ, for example, as a centimillimeter, symbol cmm, which is certainly easily understood but not an SI name or symbol approved by the BIPM.

2

hú 斛 In China, a old unit of capacity, about 51.77 liters (about 1.47 U.S. bushel). It = 10 dou (斗); 5 dou after the Southern Song.