Ultra-low Phase Noise Frequency Synthesis from Optical Atomic Frequency Standards

Published

June 26, 2014

Author(s)

David A. Howe, Archita Hati, Craig W. Nelson

Abstract

We discuss frequency synthesizer needs and recent phase-noise results of a multi-level frequency divider that are consistent with phase noise of new high-accuracy optical atomic standards. Optical atomic standards achieve extremely low frequency uncertainty in less than hundreds of seconds due to their unprecedented levels of phase stability and accuracy. Desired low white-FM that ordinarily required days of averaging for laboratory standards to attain full accuracy has been shifted to a need for low flicker-FM to maintain long-term frequency uncertainty down to seconds of averaging. This imposes new requirements for low levels of phase noise realizable by laser stabilization by a hi-Q optical cavity of a phase-coherent optical frequency comb. The multi-level frequency divide serves as a tool for synthesizing many low-phase noise frequencies useful to metrology needs.

Proceedings Title

Proceedings of 2014 European Frequency and Time Forum (EFTF)

Conference Dates

June 23-26, 2014

Conference Location

Neuchatel

Conference Title

2014 European Frequency and Time Forum (EFTF)

Pub Type

Conferences

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Keywords

accuracy, atomic, frequency synthesizer, optical atomic standard, optical frequency divider, oscillator, phase noise, stability

Citation

Howe, D. , Hati, A. and Nelson, C. (2014), Ultra-low Phase Noise Frequency Synthesis from Optical Atomic Frequency Standards, Proceedings of 2014 European Frequency and Time Forum (EFTF), Neuchatel, -1, [online], https://tsapps.nist.gov/publication/get_pdf.cfm?pub_id=916299 (Accessed October 18, 2025)