An atomic clock is a type of precision timekeeping device that achieves superior stabilityby referencing its frequency to the transition between energy states of atoms, which are
the same everywhere and do not change over time. Relentless effort has been devoted
to atomic clocks since their advent in the early 1950s. The most accurate clock today
achieves an uncertainty on the order of 10−18 based on optical transitions, over 7 orders of
magnitude lower than the first generation atomic clock. A number of applications, such
as scientific experiments, navigation and communications, have thus benefited from the
development of precision atomic clocks.
While advanced atomic clocks meet or even surpass the frequency stability requirement
for most applications, they are often bulky, power-hungry and expensive. Few solutions
exist that combine the atomic grade accuracy with the size, power and cost of quartz
oscillators. These portable precision clocks find application in, for example, seismic data
acquisition and underwater navigation. Atomic clocks based on gaseous molecular rotational resonance, which typically falls into the millimeter-wave spectrum, are also known
as molecular clocks. They have the potential to fill the gap in highly stable and low-cost
frequency standards, due to advancements in the silicon process and circuit design at
mm-Wave frequencies. Locking to the rotational resonance in molecular clocks could be
achieved exclusively with a set of mm-Wave transceivers. Without the need for microwave
cavities, lasers or discharge lamps used in other types of atomic clocks, the size, cost and
power of molecular clocks are expected to be lower.
In this work, a molecular clock based on the 10 ← 9 transition of the carbonyl sulfide
gas is implemented. Techniques to remove the linear baseline in the absorption profile
and to reduce the transmitter phase noise are presented. The sources that affect the
frequency stability are discussed as well. In addition, a high-power and high-efficiency
millimeter-wave oscillator has been designed in CMOS, to address the signal generation
difficulty in millimeter-wave transmitters.