Michael Y. Peng

Photonic ADC: overcoming the bottleneck of electronic jitter

Accurate conversion of wideband multi-GHz analog signals into the digital domain has long been a target of analog-to-digital converter (ADC) developers, driven by applications in radar systems, software radio, medical imaging, and communication systems. Aperture jitter has been a major bottleneck on the way towards higher speeds and better accuracy. Photonic ADCs, which perform sampling using ultra-stable optical pulse trains generated by mode-locked lasers, have been investigated for many years as a promising approach to overcome the jitter problem and bring ADC performance to new levels. This work demonstrates that the photonic approach can deliver on its promise by digitizing a 41 GHz signal with 7.0 effective bits using a photonic ADC built from discrete components. This accuracy corresponds to a timing jitter of 15 fs - a 4-5 times improvement over the performance of the best electronic ADCs which exist today. On the way towards an integrated photonic ADC, a silicon photonic chip with core photonic components was fabricated and used to digitize a 10 GHz signal with 3.5 effective bits. In these experiments, two wavelength channels were implemented, providing the overall sampling rate of 2.1 GSa/s. To show that photonic ADCs with larger channel counts are possible, a dual 20-channel silicon filter bank has been demonstrated.

Long-term stable, sub-femtosecond timing distribution via a 1.2-km polarization-maintaining fiber link: approaching 10 −21 link stability

Long-term stable, sub-femtosecond timing distribution over a 1.2-km polarization-maintaining (PM) fiber-optic link using balanced optical cross-correlators for link stabilization is demonstrated. Novel dispersion-compensating PM fiber was developed to construct a dispersion-slope-compensated PM link, which eliminated slow timing drifts and jumps previously induced by polarization mode dispersion in standard single-mode fiber. Numerical simulations of nonlinear pulse propagation in the fiber link confirmed potential sub-100-as timing stability for pulse energies below 70 pJ. Link operation for 16 days showed ~0.6 fs RMS timing drift and during a 3-day interval only ~0.13 fs drift, which corresponds to a stability level of 10(-21).

One-femtosecond, long-term stable remote laser synchronization over a 3.5-km fiber link

Long-term stable remote laser synchronization over a 3.5 km long polarization maintaining fiber link is demonstrated. The residual rms-timing jitter and drift over 36-hour operation is 0.96 fs integrated from 100 μHz to 1 MHz.

Balanced optical-microwave phase detector for sub-femtosecond optical-RF synchronization.

We demonstrate that balanced optical-microwave phase detectors (BOMPD) are capable of optical-RF synchronization with sub-femtosecond residual timing jitter for large-scale timing distribution systems. RF-to-optical synchronization is achieved with a long-term stability of < 1 fs RMS and < 7 fs pk-pk drift for over 10 hours and short-term stability of < 2 fs RMS jitter integrated from 1 Hz to 200 kHz as well as optical-to-RF synchronization with 0.5 fs RMS jitter integrated from 1 Hz to 20 kHz. Moreover, we achieve a -161 dBc/Hz noise floor that integrates well into the sub-fs regime and measure a nominal 50-dB AM-PM suppression ratio with potential improvement via DC offset adjustment.

Attosecond precision multi-kilometer laser-microwave network

Synchronous laser-microwave networks delivering attosecond timing precision are highly desirable in many advanced applications, such as geodesy, very-long-baseline interferometry, high-precision navigation and multi-telescope arrays. In particular, rapidly expanding photon-science facilities like X-ray free-electron lasers and intense laser beamlines require system-wide attosecond-level synchronization of dozens of optical and microwave signals up to kilometer distances. Once equipped with such precision, these facilities will initiate radically new science by shedding light on molecular and atomic processes happening on the attosecond timescale, such as intramolecular charge transfer, Auger processes and their impacts on X-ray imaging. Here we present for the first time a complete synchronous laser-microwave network with attosecond precision, which is achieved through new metrological devices and careful balancing of fiber nonlinearities and fundamental noise contributions. We demonstrate timing stabilization of a 4.7-km fiber network and remote optical–optical synchronization across a 3.5-km fiber link with an overall timing jitter of 580 and 680 attoseconds root-mean-square, respectively, for over 40 h. Ultimately, we realize a complete laser-microwave network with 950-attosecond timing jitter for 18 h. This work can enable next-generation attosecond photon-science facilities to revolutionize many research fields from structural biology to material science and chemistry to fundamental physics.

All fiber-coupled, long-term stable timing distribution for free-electron lasers with few-femtosecond jitter

We report recent progress made in a complete fiber-optic, high-precision, long-term stable timing distribution system for synchronization of next generation X-ray free-electron lasers. Timing jitter characterization of the master laser shows less than 170-as RMS integrated jitter for frequencies above 10 kHz, limited by the detection noise floor. Timing stabilization of a 3.5-km polarization-maintaining fiber link is successfully achieved with an RMS drift of 3.3 fs over 200 h of operation using all fiber-coupled elements. This all fiber-optic implementation will greatly reduce the complexity of optical alignment in timing distribution systems and improve the overall mechanical and timing stability of the system.

Breaking the Femtosecond Barrier in Multi-Kilometer Timing Synchronization Systems

To observe electronic dynamics in atoms, molecules, and condensed matter taking place on an attosecond time scale, next-generation photon science facilities like X-ray free-electron lasers and intense laser beamlines require system-wide attosecond-level synchronization of dozens of optical and microwave signals up to kilometer distances. Here, we present for the first time a timing synchronization system that can meet the strict timing requirements of such large-scale facilities. We discuss some key enabling technologies including master-laser jitter characterization, local timing synchronization, new designs of attosecond-precision timing/phase detectors, and analyze fundamental noise contributions in nonlinear pulse propagation in fiber links. Finally, a complete 4.7-km laser-microwave network with 950-as timing jitter is realized over tens of hours of continuous operation.

1.2-km timing-stabilized, polarization-maintaining fiber link with sub-femtosecond residual timing jitter

A 1.2-km timing-stabilized, polarization-maintaining fiber link based on balanced optical cross-correlation was demonstrated with ~0.9 fs RMS timing jitter over 16 days and ~0.2 fs RMS timing jitter over 3 days.

Thermally tuned dual 20-channel ring resonator filter bank in SOI (silicon-on-insulator)

Two 20-channel second-order optical filter banks have been fabricated. With tuning, the requirements for a wavelength multiplexed photonic AD-converter (insertion loss 1-3 dB, extinction >;30 dB and optical bandwidth 22-27 GHz) are met.

Synchronous mode-locked laser network with sub-fs drift and multi-km distance

We report recent progress made in a synchronous multi-color mode-locked laser network over 4.7-km distance. Output of two remotely synchronized lasers shows only 0.6-fs RMS drift over 40 hours reaching 20th decimal uncertainty in less than 10000-s averaging time. This work will enable sub-fs synchronization of new generation photon science facilities and allow km-scale optical clock comparison with unprecedented precision.