Component-level demonstration of a microfabricated atomic frequency reference

Abstract

Abstract-We demonstrate component-level functionality of the three critical subsystems for a miniature atomic clock based on microfabrication techniques: the physics package, the local oscillator and the control electronics. In addition, we demonstrate that these three components operating together achieve a short-term frequency instability of 6×10 -10

Technological Assessment of MEMS Alkali Vapor Cells for Atomic References

“…The first technical realizations of microelectromechanical systems (MEMS) miniaturized Cs/Rb atomic clock were achieved by Kitching [9,10]. Several conceptual works paved the way for obtaining a laboratory prototype of the chip-scale atomic clock (CSAC) [11,12,13,14,15,16,17,18,19,20,21,22,23,24,25,26,27,28,29,30]. Microsemi Corporation provides the CSAC SA.45s miniature atomic clock, which is the only commercially available clock of its type.…”

Integrated physics package of a chip-scale atomic clock

“…The National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) in the USA firstly realized the fabrication of micromachined cesium vapor cells [2] and vertically integrated physics package. [3][4][5] The total volume of the packaged device was 0.7 cm 3 , its power is required to be 110 mW at an ambient temperature of 25 • C, and the realized short-term frequency instability is 6 × 10 −10 τ −1/2 . Symmetricom, Charles Stark Draper Labora-tory, and Sandia National Laboratories in the USA developed a physics package with suspension structure.…”

A Local Oscillator for Chip-Scale Atomic Clocks at NIST

“…In recent years, chip-scale atomic clocks have progressed from concept [1] to working subsystems [2][3][4][5][6] and prototypes [7]. The goal, specified by the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) has been to create a frequency reference that is less than 1 cm3 in size, that achieves a frequency instability below 10-" at one hour of integration, and that operates on less than 30 mW of power.…”