517 research outputs found
Cryogenic sapphire oscillator with exceptionally high long-term frequency stability
We report on the development of a sapphire cryogenic microwave resonator
oscillator long-term fractional frequency stability of 2x10^-17Sqrt[\tau] for
integration times \tau>10^3 s and negative drift of about 2.2x10^-15/day. The
short-term frequency instability of the oscillator is highly reproducible and
also state-of-the-art: 5.6x10^-16 for an integration time of \tau ~ 20 s.Comment: Accepted for publication in Applied Physics Letter
High Resolution Flicker-Noise-Free Frequency Measurements of Weak Microwave Signals
Amplification is usually necessary when measuring the frequency instability
of microwave signals. In this work, we develop a flicker noise free frequency
measurement system based on a common or shared amplifier. First, we show that
correlated flicker phase noise can be cancelled in such a system. Then we
compare the new system with the conventional by simultaneously measuring the
beat frequency from two cryogenic sapphire oscillators with parts in 10^15
fractional frequency instability. We determine for low power, below -80 dBm,
the measurements were not limited by correlated noise processes but by thermal
noise of the readout amplifier. In this regime, we show that the new readout
system performs as expected and at the same level as the standard system but
with only half the number of amplifiers. We also show that, using a standard
readout system, the next generation of cryogenic sapphire oscillators could be
flicker phase noise limited when instability reaches parts in 10^16 or betterComment: Accepted for publication in IEEE Transactions on Microwave Theory &
Technique
Ultra-Low Noise Microwave Extraction from Fiber-Based Optical Frequency Comb
In this letter, we report on all-optical fiber approach to the generation of
ultra-low noise microwave signals. We make use of two erbium fiber mode-locked
lasers phase locked to a common ultra-stable laser source to generate an 11.55
GHz signal with an unprecedented relative phase noise of -111 dBc/Hz at 1 Hz
from the carrier.The residual frequency instability of the microwave signals
derived from the two optical frequency combs is below 2.3 10^(-16) at 1s and
about 4 10^(-19) at 6.5 10^(4)s (in 5 Hz bandwidth, three days continuous
operation).Comment: 12 pages, 3 figure
An Ultra-Stable Referenced Interrogation System in the Deep Ultraviolet for a Mercury Optical Lattice Clock
We have developed an ultra-stable source in the deep ultraviolet, suitable to
fulfill the interrogation requirements of a future fully-operational lattice
clock based on neutral mercury. At the core of the system is a Fabry-P\'erot
cavity which is highly impervious to temperature and vibrational perturbations.
The mirror substrate is made of fused silica in order to exploit the
comparatively low thermal noise limits associated with this material. By
stabilizing the frequency of a 1062.6 nm Yb-doped fiber laser to the cavity,
and including an additional link to LNE-SYRTE's fountain primary frequency
standards via an optical frequency comb, we produce a signal which is both
stable at the 1E-15 level in fractional terms and referenced to primary
frequency standards. The signal is subsequently amplified and frequency-doubled
twice to produce several milliwatts of interrogation signal at 265.6 nm in the
deep ultraviolet.Comment: 7 pages, 6 figure
ELISA: a cryocooled 10 GHz oscillator with 10-15 frequency stability
This article reports the design, the breadboarding and the validation of an
ultra-stable Cryogenic Sapphire Oscillator operated in an autonomous
cryocooler. The objective of this project was to demonstrate the feasibility of
a frequency stability of 3x10-15 between 1 s and 1,000 s for the European Space
Agency deep space stations. This represents the lowest fractional frequency
instability ever achieved with cryocoolers. The preliminary results presented
in this paper validate the design we adopted for the sapphire resonator, the
cold source and the oscillator loop.Comment: 13 pages, 10 figure
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