Time-interleaved sampling analog-to-digital conversion utilizing photonic radio frequency memory

Abstract

A novel photonic-assisted time-interleaved sampling analog-to-digital converter (ADC) utilizing photonic radio frequency memory (PRFM) is proposed. The analog modulated optical signal can be duplicated by PRFM and digitized by a slower electronic ADC, thus increasing of equivalent sampling rate to hundreds of times. A microwave photonic link simulation model investigating the performance of sampling an RF signal with a 55ns duration and 500MHz bandwidth was conducted with 4.9 effective number of bits (ENOB). The equivalent sampling rate reached more than 3.6 GSample/s, an increase of over 360 times of the original 10 MSample/s rate.