High-Speed Waveform Metrology Group

The High-Speed Waveform Metrology Group's work applies to a wide variety of communications and computing technologies and is of particular importance to CTL’s Next-Generation 5G Wireless and Fundamental Metrology for Communications program areas. To facilitate these programs we develop standards and metrology for the ultrafast circuits needed for the communications and computer networks of the future.  Our group includes two primary projects: High-Frequency Electronics and Waveform Metrology.

Capabilities

DC-THZ ON-WAFER MEASUREMENTS

This project is dedicated to improving the on-chip measurement of very-high-speed transistors (into the hundreds of gigahertz) as well as characterizing the nonlinear behavior of high-power, lower-frequency (microwave to millimeter-wave) transistors. Combinations of these transistors will be indispensable to next-generation wireless systems and open up a new high-frequency spectrum to the wireless industry. In addition to the High-Frequency Electronics Project, there are two exciting activities within this program sponsored by the NIST Innovations in Measurement Science awards: Josephson Arbitrary Waveform Synthesizer (JAWS) and the DC to 1 THz Large-Amplitude Optoelectronic Multitone Electrical-Signal Synthesizer.

MICROWAVE UNCERTAINTY ANALYSIS

The NIST Microwave Uncertainty Framework is a software tool developed to calculate uncertainty using conventional error-propagation analysis and Monte Carlo analysis. Active development of this framework includes the propagation of correlated uncertainties (which are required for traceable modulated signal measurements and many communication metrics), extending uncertainty propagation to nonlinear processes and system-level applications, and facilitating complex correlated uncertainty analyses required by the traceability chains of modern communications systems. Furthermore, we are using this framework to establish traceability for mmWave channel measurements, critical to the development of 5G technologies.
 

PRIMARY WAVEFORM TRACEABILITY

This project has historically developed optoelectronic and statistical signal analysis techniques to characterize high-speed instrumentation used by the fiber optics, digital IC, and wireless industries as well as the Department of Defense (DoD) Primary Standards Laboratories and DoD contractors. Four NIST innovations lie at the core of the project’s work: calibration of impedance mismatch and loss effects in signal measurements; traceable electro-optic sampling (EOS) for frequency-response calibration; the calibration of timing errors, response errors, and impedance effects in sampling oscilloscopes; and uncertainty analysis that transforms waveform uncertainties between the time and frequency domains. 

NIST was the first NMI to develop phase calibration capability through EOS and to map this calibration into waveform measurements and waveform measurement uncertainty. The Waveform Metrology Project maintains several calibration services that are used to provide traceability for commercial instrumentation, such as large-signal network analyzers, lightwave component analyzers, vector signal analyzers, oscilloscopes, pulsed laser radiometers, and optical time-domain radiometers. NMIs in South Korea, China, Germany, and the U.K. are actively working on developing similar waveform measurement services.

AWARDS

• 2022 - Allen V. Astin Measurement Science Award---Dazhen Gu, Aaron Hagerstrom, Benjamin Jamroz, Jeffrey Jargon, Christian Long, Ann F. Monke, Eric Stanfield, Angela Stelson, John Stoup, Dylan Williams | NIST For developing rigorous traceability with correlated uncertainties for microwave power and scattering parameters at 5G/6G communications frequencies.
• Jerome Cheron won the 2021 IEEE BiCMOS and Compound Semiconductor Integrated Circuits and Technology Symposium (BCICTS) Best Paper award for this work: https://www.nist.gov/news-events/news/2021/12/solid-state-thz-amplifier-breaking-records
• 2017 - Gold Medal Award---Ari D. Feldman, Sheryl M. Genco, Michael D. Janezic, Azizollah Kord, Daniel G. Kuester, John M. Ladbury, Duncan A. McGillivray, Adam J. Wunderlich, Wen-Bin Yang, William F. Young | NIST In less than one year, the group successfully developed a new test methodology and performed complex radiated measurements to quantitatively assess the impact of LTE wireless signals on the performance of GPS receivers operating in the RNSS L1 frequency band. This breakthrough has helped industry evaluate future wireless communications technologies that may be deployed in this frequency band and has assisted the spectrum regulators (the FCC and NTIA) in their efforts to develop future spectrum policies.
• R&D 100 Award - PhotoForce Project | NIST For the development of a Radiation Pressure Power Meter that enables extremely high continuous laser powers to be measured as the force applied by the laser light reflects from a mirror.