A low phase-noise voltage-controlled SAW oscillator with surface transverse wave resonator for SONET application

Abstract

A surface transverse wave (STW) resonator-based oscillator was developed in response to SONET OC-48 application. To meet the low jitter objective, a high-Q STW resonator was designed and fabricated in this study. The residual phase-noise measurement techniques are used to evaluate the feedback oscillator components, such as the loop amplifier, STW resonator, and electronic phase shifter, which can play important roles in determining the oscillator's output phase-noise spectrum. The oscillator's white phase-noise floor is -170 dBc/Hz for carrier-offset frequency greater than 1 MHz. The oscillator's phase-noise level is -67 dBc/Hz at a 100-Hz carrier offset. Both low close-in phase-noise and low white phase-noise floor makes the oscillator meet low jitter requirement. The electronic frequency tuning range exceeds +/- 200 ppm. The oscillator provides 13.5 dBm of output power and consumes 65 mA from +5-V power supply.