Abstract A concept of interferometric measurements has been applied to the development of ultra-sensitive microwave noise measurement systems. These systems are capable of reaching a noise performance limited only by the thermal fluctuations in their lossy components. The noise floor of a real time microwave measurement system has been measured to be equal to -193 dBc/Hz at Fourier frequencies above 1 kHz. This performance is 40~dB better than that of conventional systems and has allowed the first experimental evidences of the intrinsic phase fluctuations in microwave isolators and circulators. Microwave frequency discriminators with interferometric signal processing have proved to be extremely effective for measuring and cancelling the phase noise in oscillators. This technique has allowed the design of X-band microwave oscillators with a phase noise spectral density of order -150 dBc/Hz at 1~kHz Fourier frequency, without the use of cryogenics. Another possible application of the interferometric noise measurements systems include “flicker noise-free” microwave amplifiers and advanced two oscillator noise measurement systems.
1998 IEEE Transactions on Ultrasonics, Ferroelectrics, and Frequency Control 45:1526-1536
© 1998, by The Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers, Inc. All rights reserved.