Optical Stabilization of a Microwave Oscillator for Fountain Clock Interrogation

Abstract

We describe an optical frequency stabilization scheme of a microwave oscillator that is used for the interrogation of primary caesium fountain clocks. Because of its superior phase noise properties, this scheme, which is based on an ultrastable laser and a femtosecond laser frequency comb, overcomes the frequency instability limitations of fountain clocks given by the previously utilized quartz-oscillator-based frequency synthesis. The presented scheme combines the transfer of the short-term frequency instability of an optical cavity and the long-term frequency instability of a hydrogen maser to the microwave oscillator and is designed to provide continuous long-term operation for extended measurement periods of several weeks. The utilization of the twofold stabilization scheme on the one hand ensures the referencing of the fountain frequency to the hydrogen maser frequency and on the other hand results in a phase noise level of the fountain interrogation signal, which enables fountain frequency instabilities at the $2.5\times 10^{-14}(\tau /\mathrm{s}{)}^{-1/2}$ level which are quantum projection noise limited.

7 pages, 4 figures, 1 table

References in corpus (6)

• Single-Ion Atomic Clock with $3\times 10^{-18}$ Systematic Uncertainty
• Improved limit on a temporal variation of $m_p/m_e$ from comparisons of Yb${}^{+}$ and Cs atomic clocks
• Progress in Atomic Fountains at LNE-SYRTE
• Characterization of Power-to-Phase Conversion in High-Speed P-I-N Photodiodes
• A Cs-Based Optical Frequency Measurement Using Cross-Linked Optical and Microwave Oscillators
• Loading of a fountain clock with an enhanced Low-Velocity Intense Source of atoms

Cited by in corpus (5)

• Advances in the accuracy, stability, and reliability of the PTB primary fountain clocks
• First international comparison of fountain primary frequency standards via a long distance optical fiber link
• The unit of time: present and future directions
• Absolute frequency measurement of a Yb optical clock at the limit of the Cs fountain
• Continuous optical generation of microwave signals for fountain clocks