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In this paper we report that carrier-phase two-way satellite time and frequency transfer (TWSTFT) was successfully demonstrated over a very long baseline of 9,000 km, established between the National Institute of Information and Communications Technology (NICT) and the Physikalisch-Technische Bundesanstalt (PTB). We verified that the carrier-phase TWSTFT (TWCP) result agreed with those obtained by conventional TWSTFT and GPS carrier-phase (GPSCP) techniques. Moreover, a much improved short-term instability for frequency transfer of 2 × 10 −13 at 1 s was achieved, which is at the same level as previously confirmed over a shorter baseline within Japan. The precision achieved was so high that the effects of ionospheric delay became significant which are ignored in conventional TWSTFT even over a long link. We compensated for these effects using ionospheric delays computed from regional vertical total electron content maps. The agreement between the TWCP and GPSCP results was improved because of this compensation.Carrier-phase Two-Way Satellite Frequency Transfer over a Very Long Baseline

We developed an all-optical link system for making remote comparisons of two distant ultra-stable optical clocks. An optical carrier transfer system based on a fiber interferometer was employed to compensate the phase noise accumulated during the propagation through a fiber link. Transfer stabilities of 2 × 10(-15) at 1 second and 4 × 10(-18) at 1000 seconds were achieved in a 90-km link. An active polarization control system was additionally introduced to maintain the transmitted light in an adequate polarization, and consequently, a stable and reliable comparison was accomplished. The instabilities of the all-optical link system, including those of the erbium doped fiber amplifiers (EDFAs) which are free from phase-noise compensation, were below 2 × 10(-15) at 1 second and 7 × 10(-17) at 1000 seconds. The system was available for the direct comparison of two distant (87)Sr lattice clocks via an urban fiber link of 60 km. This technique will be essential for the measuring the reproducibility of optical frequency standards.

An rf dissemination system using an optical fiber link has been developed. The phase noise induced during optical fiber transmission has been successfully cancelled using what we believe to be a novel fiber-noise compensation system with a combination of electrical and optical compensations. We have performed rf transfer in a 114 km urban telecom fiber link in Tokyo with a transfer stability of 10(-18) level at an averaging time of 1 day. Additionally, a high degree of continuous operation robustness has been confirmed.

We have demonstrated a microwave transfer over a 204-km noisy urban fiber link by a cascaded system with 2 stages, which connected 10-GHz and 1-GHz transfer systems in series. A diurnal phase-noise cancellation ratio of 45 dB was obtained by use of an electronic phase-noise compensation system. Additionally, the stabilities reached 6 x 10(-14) at 1 s and 5 x 10(-17) at one-half day, which agreed with the root-sum-square of those of the 10-GHz and 1-GHz transfers. We verified for the first time that the transfer stability degrades only square root N times in a cascaded system with N stages.