title: Radio-frequency clock delivery via free-space frequency comb transmission.
abstract: We characterize the instability of an rf clock signal caused by free-space transmission of a frequency comb (FC) under typical laboratory conditions. The phase-noise spectra show the involvement of multiple random processes. For a 10 m transmission, the rms timing jitter integrated over 1-10(5) Hz is 95 fs, and the root Allan variance over 1 s is 4x10(-13). The measured Allan variance has a tau(-1) behavior and an excellent agreement with the phase noise measurement. These results indicate the feasibility of FC-based free-space rf clock distribution over short distances.
authors.affiliation: Department of Physics, University of Alabama in Huntsville, Huntsville, Alabama 35899, USA.
authors.forename: Ayshah
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Alatawi
authors.forename: Ravi P
authors.initials: RP
authors.lastname: Gollapalli
authors.forename: Lingze
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: Duan