0000000000184308
AUTHOR
Enrico Rubiola
showing 11 related works from this author
A fully-digital realtime SoC FPGA based phase noise analyzer with cross-correlation
2017
We report on a fully-digital and realtime operation of a phase noise analyzer using modern digital techniques with cross-correlation. With the advent of system on chip field-programmable gate arrays (SoC FPGAs) embedding hard core central processing unit, coprocessor and FPGA onto a single integrated circuit, the building of sensitive analysis devices for Time & Frequency research is made accessible at virtually no cost and benefits from reconfigurability. Used with high-speed digitizers we have successfully implemented a four-channel system whose preliminary results at 10 MHz shows a residual white noise floor < −185 dBrad2/Hz up to 5 MHz off the carrier, and flicker < −127 dBrad2/Hz using…
Cross-Spectrum PM Noise Measurement, Thermal Energy, and Metamaterial Filters.
2017
International audience; Virtually all commercial instruments for the measurement of the oscillator PM noise make use of the crossspectrum method (arXiv:1004.5539 [physics.ins-det], 2010). High sensitivity is achieved by correlation and averaging on two equal channels, which measure the same input, and reject the background of the instrument.We show that a systematic error is always present if the thermal energy of the input power splitter is not accounted for. Such error can result in noise underestimation up to a few decibels in the lowest-noise quartz oscillators, and in an invalid measurement in the case of cryogenic oscillators. As another alarming fact, the presence of metamaterial com…
Equivalence of Open-Loop and Closed-Loop Operation of SAW Resonators and Delay Lines
2019
International audience; Surface acoustic wave (SAW) sensors in the form of two-port resonators or delay lines are widely used in various fields of application. The readout of such sensors is achieved by electronic systems operating either in an open-loop or in a closed-loop configuration. The mode of operation of the sensor system is usually chosen based on requirements like, e.g., bandwidth, dynamic range, linearity, costs, and immunity against environmental influences. Because the limit of detection (LOD) at the output of a sensor system is often one of the most important figures of merit, both readout structures, i.e., open-loop and closed-loop systems, are analyzed in terms of the minim…
Residual Phase Noise Measurement of Optical Second Harmonic Generation in PPLN Waveguides
2017
We report on the characterization, including residual phase noise and fractional frequency instability, of fiber-coupled PPLN non-linear crystals. These components are devoted to frequency doubling 871 nm light from an extended-cavity diode laser to produce a 435.5 nm beam, corresponding to the ytterbium ion electric quadrupole clock transition. We measure doubling efficiencies of up to 117.5 %/W. Using a Mach-Zehnder interferometer and an original noise rejection technique, the residual phase noise of the doublers is estimated to be lower than ${\rm -35\, dBrad^2/Hz}$ at 1 Hz, making these modules compatible with up-to-date optical clocks and ultra-stable cavities. The influence of externa…
Phase-Noise and Amplitude-Noise Measurement of DACs and DDSs
2019
This article proposes a method for the measurement of Phase Noise (PN, or PM noise) and Amplitude Noise (AN, or AM noise) of Digital-to-Analog Converters (DAC) and Direct Digital Synthesizers (DDS) based on modulation-index amplification. The carrier is first reduced by a controlled amount (30-40 dB) by adding a reference signal of nearly equal amplitude and opposite in phase. Then, residual carrier and noise sidebands are amplified and sent to a conventional PN analyzer. The main virtues of our method are: (i) the noise specs of the PN analyzer are relaxed by a factor equal to the carrier suppression ratio; and, (ii) the capability to measure the AN using a PN analyzer, with no need for th…
Fundamental Noise Limits and Sensitivity of Piezoelectrically Driven Magnetoelastic Cantilevers
2020
International audience; Magnetoelastic sensors for the detection of low-frequency and low-amplitude magnetic fields are in the focus of research for more than 30 years. In order to minimize the limit of detection (LOD) of such sensor systems, it is of high importance to understand and to be able to quantify the relevant noise sources. In this contribution, cantilever-type electromechanical and magnetoelastic resonators, respectively, are comprehensively investigated and mathematically described not only with regard to their phase sensitivity but especially to the extent of the sensor-intrinsic phase noise. Both measurements and calculations reveal that the fundamental LOD is limited by addi…
Artifacts and Errors in Cross-Spectrum Phase Noise Measurements : Invited lecture
2021
Inserting an attenuator between the oscillator under test and the phase noise analyzer, one expects that the white phase noise increases monotonically with the attenuation. By contrast, we observe that with some oscillators the white noise has sharp minimum for a given value of the attenuation, which clearly indicates problem. With other oscillators, it increases monotonically with the attenuation, but the values are not consistent with the thermal energy introduced by the attenuator. In both cases artifacts are present, which takes the form of a sharp notch in the spectrum, occurring where the white FM noise crosses the white PM noise. Such anomalous behavior is the tip of the iceberg, and…
Phase Noise and Frequency Stability of the Red-Pitaya Internal PLL
2019
In field-programmable gate array platforms, the main clock is generally a low-cost quartz oscillator whose stability is of the order of $10^{-9}$ to $10^{-10}$ in the short term and $10^{-7}$ to $10^{-8}$ in the medium term, with the uncertainty of tens of ppm. Better stability is achieved by feeding an external reference into the internal phase-locked loop (PLL). We report the noise characterization of the internal PLL of Red-Pitaya platform, an open-source embedded system architected around the Zynq 7010 System on Chip, with analog-to-digital and digital-to-analog converters. Our experiments show that, providing an external 10-MHz reference, the PLL exhibits a residual frequency stability…
Noise Analysis and Comparison of Phase-and Frequency-Detecting Readout Systems: Application to SAW Delay Line Magnetic Field Sensor
2019
International audience; Transmission surface acoustic wave (SAW) sensors are widely used in various fields of application. In order to improve the limit of detection (LOD) of such sensor systems, it is essential to understand and quantify the relevant noise sources. Only then, strategies for noise reduction can be developed. In this paper, low noise readout systems for the application with SAW sensors in an open-loop and a closed-loop configuration are presented and experimentally investigated with regard to their phase noise on the example of a SAW delay line magnetic field sensor. Besides a comprehensive analysis of the phaseand frequency modulated signals, respectively, previously derive…
Noise characterization of analog to digital converters for amplitude and phase noise measurements
2017
International audience; Improvements on electronic technology in recent years have allowed the application of digital techniques in phase noise metrology where low noise and high accuracy are required, yielding flexibility in systems implementation and setup. This results in measurement systems with extended capabilities, additional functionalities and ease of use. In most digital schemes the Analog to Digital Converters (ADCs) set the ultimate performance of the system, therefore the proper selection of this component is a critical issue. Currently, the information available in literature describes in depth the ADC features only at frequency offsets far from the carrier. However, the perfo…
Frequency Stability Measurement of Cryogenic Sapphire Oscillators with a Multichannel Tracking DDS and the Two-Sample Covariance
2018
This article shows the first measurement of three 100 MHz signals exhibiting fluctuations from 2E-16 to parts in 1E-15 for integration time tau between 1 s and 1 day. Such stable signals are provided by three Cryogenic Sapphire Oscillators (CSOs) operating at about 10 GHz, also delivering the 100 MHz output via a dedicated synthesizer. The measurement is made possible by a 6-channel Tracking DDS (TDDS) and the two-sample covariance tool, used to estimate the Allan variance. The use of two TDDS channels per CSO enables high rejection of the instrument background noise. The covariance outperforms the Three-Cornered Hat (TCH) method in that the background converges to zero "out of the box," wi…