SBIR Phase II: Chip-Scale Optical Frequency Standards

SBIR 第二阶段：芯片级光频率标准

• 批准号: 2322392
• 负责人: Douglas Bopp
• 金额: $ 95.63万
• 依托单位: VAPOR CELL TECHNOLOGIES LLC
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 项目类别: Cooperative Agreement
• 财政年份: 2023
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2023-10-01 至 2025-09-30
• 项目状态: 未结题
• 来源: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=2322392&HistoricalAwards=false
• 关键词: SBIR; Phase; II; Chip; Scale

This Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) Phase II project produces compact optical frequency standards using state-of-the-art optical frequency metrology techniques adopted from national metrology institutes. Commercially, these devices will produce fundamentally accurate and stable optical frequencies in the form of laser light. End uses of these optical frequency standards include telecommunications test equipment, aerospace sensors, semiconductor inspection tools, and chemical measurement tools. The market trend is to produce more compact, mass-producible devices to improve sensing capabilities across industries. Improving the accuracy and stability of compact photonics technologies will enable next-generation microelectronics and photonic systems to produce reliable measurements without sacrificing durability or sensitivity. The resulting products will be inexpensive and will lend themselves to scalable manufacturing. Making these products accessible to the scientific and technology communities will enable researchers and engineers to build intrinsically accurate products based on definitions of the International System of Units (SI) second. This product will compete within the Atomic Clock Marketplace which is valued at $300 million, and which is growing at 6.25% per year. This effort has the potential to reverse the ongoing problem of price-creep of timekeeping devices that is currently preventing the large-scale adoption of quantum standards.The intellectual merit of this project is to use advances in microfabrication techniques combined with fundamental molecular and optical physics to produce compact, stable, and accurate optical frequency standards. Measurement science requires the distribution and availability of measurement references and standards. Optical frequency standards serve a variety of niche applications requiring accurate measurements with light. This research will improve the purity of chip-scale iodine vapor cells using novel materials and also fully investigate the materials invented during the Phase I period of performance. These vapor cells will be practical realizations of the SI second as agreed upon by internationally accepted standards protocols. The core technical innovation in this project will focus on producing a ‘physics package’ containing a chip-scale iodine vapor cell with electrical functionality for controlling the vapor pressure, laser light routing for implementing high-resolution spectroscopy, and a software interface that converts the various sensor inputs into a precise and accurate measurement of a molecular transition. The team will leverage trends in optical clocks that have proved the utility of software-defined algorithms in the interrogation, synthesis, and discipline of physics packages to counter environmental and measurement-related disturbances ultimately producing a stable and accurate device.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.

这项小型企业创新研究（SBIR）第二阶段项目使用国家计量学院采用的最先进的光学频率计量技术生成紧凑的光频量标准。从商业上讲，这些设备将以激光的形式产生从根本上准确稳定的光学频率。这些光学频率标准的最终用途包括电信测试设备，航空传感器，半导体检查工具和化学测量工具。市场趋势是生产更紧凑的质量可实现设备，以提高行业的灵敏度能力。提高紧凑光子技术技术的准确性和稳定性将使下一代微电子和光子系统能够产生可靠的测量，而无需牺牲耐用性或灵敏度。最终的产品将是便宜的，并且将使自己可以进行可扩展的制造。使这些产品可供科学和技术社区访问，这将使研究人员和工程师能够根据国际单位系统（SI）的定义来构建本质上准确的产品。该产品将在原子钟市场中竞争，价值为3亿美元，每年增长6.25％。这种努力有可能扭转定时设备的价格搜索问题的持续问题，该问题目前正在阻止大规模采用量子标准。该项目的智力优点是在微制化技术中使用进步，结合基本分子和光学物理学来产生紧凑，稳定，稳定，稳定，稳定，稳定，准确的光学频率。测量科学需要测量参考和标准的分布和可用性。光学频率标准服务为需要光线进行准确测量的各种利基应用。这项研究将使用新型材料提高芯片尺度碘蒸气细胞的纯度，并充分研究在性能期间I期时期发明的材料。这些蒸气细胞将是由国际接受标准方案同意的SI第二个实用的实现。该项目的核心技术创新将集中在生产一个“物理套件”上，该“物理套件”包含具有电气功能的芯片尺度碘蒸气电池，可控制蒸气压，激光光路由，用于实现高分辨率界面，可将各种传感器输入转换为精确测量和准确的分解物质转换。该团队将利用在审讯，综合和纪律中提供软件定义算法实用的光时趋势，以应对与环境和测量有关的灾害，最终产生稳定且准确的设备。这是NSF的法定任务和审查的范围，这是通过评估的范围来弥补的。