Researchers from the National Institute of Standards and Technology and their partners from other institutions have demonstrated a chip that converts light into microwaves while reducing small, random changes in microwave signal timing called timing jitter.
The improved stability of the microwave signals can benefit other technologies that depend on high-precision timing and communication, including radars, phone and internet connections and GPS, NIST said Wednesday.
The current phase of the work sought to demonstrate that the various components of the technology — including lasers, amplifiers and modulators — could work together, according to Frank Quinlan, a physical scientist with NIST. The next phase aims to integrate them into a single chip.
Another achievement in the demonstration is the miniaturization of the components. A system that would otherwise have come in the size of a tabletop was reduced to the size of a digital camera memory card.
The reduction of timing jitter at that scale reduces power usage.