CMOS THz Molecular Clock With Enhanced Stability And Energy Efficiency

具有增强稳定性和能源效率的 CMOS 太赫兹分子时钟

• 批准号: 1809917
• 负责人: Ruonan Han
• 金额: $ 33万
• 依托单位: Massachusetts Institute of Technology
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 项目类别: Standard Grant
• 财政年份: 2018
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2018-08-15 至 2021-07-31
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=1809917&HistoricalAwards=false
• 关键词: CMOS; THz; Molecular; Clock; Enhanced

High performance clock, which provides a stable output reference frequency, is critical in electronic systems for navigation, security, wireless broadcasting, telecommunication network synchronization, and various sensing applications (e.g. magnetometer). Although a high-precision timing signal can be obtained from Global Positioning System (GPS) satellites, it is unavailable in many scenarios (e.g., underwater, underground, and certain indoor conditions). GPS timing is also susceptible to electromagnetic interference, especially at wartime. It is therefore of great importance to have innovative high-stability time-keeping devices local to the electronic systems. Since many of the electronic systems are mobile, their internal clocks should also be small and energy efficient. At present, the widely used clock devices, such as the crystal oscillators and the microelectromechanical system (MEMS) oscillators, can only achieve stability in the range of 0.01 ppm to 100 ppm, which is inadequate for many of the above applications. Achieving much better stability, the high-end oscillators used for precision timing would also consume much higher power of several watts. On the other hand, the atomic clocks, with their outputs locked to certain physical constants, offer excellent stability. This, however, comes at the expense of exceedingly large form factor and cost. This project proposed a novel terahertz (THz) molecular clock to address the above challenges. The proposed new solution will achieve stability in the range of parts per trillion, which will be several orders better than the current state-of-the-arts. The results will advance the THz science and engineering, and have significant potential impacts on billions of electronic systems. The research will be tightly integrated with the undergraduate and graduate education at MIT to cultivate the future engineering leaders with interdisciplinary training and vision. In this project, new approaches, which link an electronic output frequency with invariant physical constant but use a physical mechanism alternative to conventional atomic physics, will be investigated. The rotational-mode transitions of polar molecules under the probing of THz waves will be utilized as time bases. The generation, detection, and control of the THz waves will be implemented using standard complementary metal-oxide-semiconductor (CMOS) integrated circuit technology. The research, therefore, is expected to lead to high-stability clocks with very small size, very little power, and very low cost. Specifically, multi-resonance of molecules will be utilized to enhance the long-term stability of the molecular clock. New packaging technology will also be applied in order to miniaturize the clock size. At the system level, the clock will also operate in a low duty-cycled manner to obtain milliwatt-level power consumption.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.

高性能时钟可提供稳定的输出参考频率，对于导航、安全、无线广播、电信网络同步和各种传感应用（例如磁力计）的电子系统至关重要。虽然可以从全球定位系统（GPS）卫星获得高精度授时信号，但在许多场景（例如水下、地下和某些室内条件）下无法获得。 GPS授时也容易受到电磁干扰，尤其是在战时。因此，在电子系统本地拥有创新的高稳定性计时设备非常重要。由于许多电子系统都是移动的，因此它们的内部时钟也应该很小并且节能。目前，广泛使用的时钟器件，例如晶体振荡器和微机电系统（MEMS）振荡器，只能实现0.01 ppm至100 ppm范围内的稳定性，这对于上述许多应用来说是不够的。为了实现更好的稳定性，用于精确计时的高端振荡器也会消耗更高的几瓦功率。另一方面，原子钟的输出锁定在某些物理常数上，具有出色的稳定性。然而，这是以极大的外形尺寸和成本为代价的。该项目提出了一种新型太赫兹（THz）分子钟来解决上述挑战。拟议的新解决方案将实现万亿分之一范围内的稳定性，这将比当前最先进的技术好几个数量级。研究结果将推动太赫兹科学和工程的发展，并对数十亿电子系统产生重大的潜在影响。该研究将与麻省理工学院的本科生和研究生教育紧密结合，培养具有跨学科训练和视野的未来工程领导者。 在该项目中，将研究新方法，将电子输出频率与不变的物理常数联系起来，但使用替代传统原子物理学的物理机制。太赫兹波探测下极性分子的旋转模式转变将被用作时基。太赫兹波的生成、检测和控制将使用标准互补金属氧化物半导体（CMOS）集成电路技术来实现。因此，这项研究有望带来尺寸非常小、功耗非常低、成本非常低的高稳定性时钟。具体来说，将利用分子的多重共振来增强分子钟的长期稳定性。新的封装技术也将被应用，以缩小时钟尺寸。在系统层面，时钟也将以低占空比的方式运行，以获得毫瓦级的功耗。该奖项反映了 NSF 的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的智力优点和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，认为值得支持。

项目成果

Sub-THz CMOS Molecular Clock with 43ppt Long-Term Stability Using High-Order Rotational Transition Probing and Slot-Array Couplers

使用高阶旋转跃迁探测和槽阵列耦合器实现具有 43ppt 长期稳定性的亚太赫兹 CMOS 分子钟

• DOI: 10.1109/isscc19947.2020.9062890
• 发表时间: 2020
• 期刊: 2020 IEEE International Solid- State Circuits Conference - (ISSCC
• 作者: Wang, Cheng;Yi, Xiang;Kim, Mina;Han, Ruonan
• 通讯作者: Han, Ruonan

Chip-Scale Molecular Clock

芯片级分子钟

• DOI: 10.1109/jssc.2018.2880920
• 发表时间: 2019
• 期刊: IEEE Journal of Solid-State Circuits
• 影响因子: 5.4
• 作者: Wang, Cheng;Yi, Xiang;Mawdsley, James;Kim, Mina;Hu, Zhi;Zhang, Yaqing;Perkins, Bradford;Han, Ruonan
• 通讯作者: Han, Ruonan

Emerging Terahertz Integrated Systems in Silicon

新兴的太赫兹硅集成系统

• DOI: 10.1109/tcsi.2021.3087604
• 发表时间: 2021
• 期刊: IEEE Transactions on Circuits and Systems I: Regular Papers
• 作者: Yi, Xiang;Wang, Cheng;Hu, Zhi;Holloway, Jack W.;Khan, Muhammad Ibrahim;Ibrahim, Mohamed I.;Kim, Mina;Dogiamis, Georgios C.;Perkins, Bradford;Kaynak, Mehmet
• 通讯作者: Kaynak, Mehmet

Chip-Scale Terahertz Carbonyl Sulfide Clock: An Overview and Recent Studies on Long-Term Frequency Stability of OCS Transitions

芯片级太赫兹羰基硫时钟：OCS 跃迁长期频率稳定性的概述和最新研究

• DOI: 10.1109/tthz.2019.2918436
• 发表时间: 2019
• 期刊: IEEE Transactions on Terahertz Science and Technology
• 影响因子: 3.2
• 作者: Kim, Mina;Wang, Cheng;Hu, Zhi;Han, Ruonan
• 通讯作者: Han, Ruonan