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IEEE MTT-S International Microwave Symposium digest

A 50 GHz monolithic RSFQ digital phase locked loop

DARREN K. BROCK, Michael S. Pambianchi

Published Nov 7, 2002• 7 citations
Publisher

Abstract

HYPRES has developed a monolithic on-chip phase-locked loop (PLL) for the stabilizing and locking of the high-frequency output of an single flux quantum (SFQ) clock source, using rapid single flux quantum (RSFQ) logic family elements for phase detection and frequency detection. This PLL was successfully fabricated and operated as a 50 GHz clock phase-locked to a MHz frequency external source. We were able to employ a feedback loop filter to correct the voltage bias on the SFQ clock and compensate for the frequency fluctuations created by voltage noise in the bias and shunt resistors. This effort resulted is a stable SFQ clock which is tunable and phase-locked to an external signal of lower frequency, and which does not increase the heat load of a circuit. Moreover, in addition to high speed synchronized clock sources, this PLL can now be used to implement new and useful devices, such as phase demodulators and clock recovery circuits.

DOI
10.1109/mwsym.2000.861014

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Phase-locked operation of RSFQ ring oscillators

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Systems requiring multiple clock frequencies are becoming more common in digital superconductive electronics. In rapid single flux quantum (RSFQ) circuits, precise frequencies are applied to different clock domains. A diverse variety of SFQ clock generators have been employed to produce a single frequency. A clock generator that uses a single voltage source to deliver multiple frequencies is presented here. The operating principle, performance, area, and power of the proposed SFQ multi-clock generator are described. Previously published clock generators are limited to a fixed frequency or varied by changing the bias DC voltage—a parameter not typically changedin situ. In the proposed approach, the clock frequency is tunable by the SFQ logic circuit. In addition, a globally asynchronous locally synchronous system is presented to exemplify the practical application of the proposed multi-clock generator

IEEE Transactions on Applied Superconductivity•Nov 7, 2025•0 citations
HYPRES has developed a monolithic on-chip phase-locked loop (PLL) for the stabilizing and locking of the high-frequency output of an single flux quantum (SFQ) clock source, using rapid single flux quantum (RSFQ) logic family elements for phase detection and frequency detection. This PLL was successfully fabricated and operated as a 50 GHz clock phase-locked to a MHz frequency external source. We were able to employ a feedback loop filter to correct the voltage bias on the SFQ clock and compensate for the frequency fluctuations created by voltage noise in the bias and shunt resistors. This effort resulted is a stable SFQ clock which is tunable and phase-locked to an external signal of lower frequency, and which does not increase the heat load of a circuit. Moreover, in addition to high speed synchronized clock sources, this PLL can now be used to implement new and useful devices, such as phase demodulators and clock recovery circuits.
Ring oscillators are the traditional on-chip clock source for RSFQ mixed-signal and digital circuits. Their long-term frequency stability is essential for certain signal processing applications such as the sampling clock for an A/D converter or the output clock of a D/A converter. However conventional bias schemes lead to excessive drift in the frequency. Embedding the ring oscillator in a phase-locked loop (PLL) circuit allows it to inherit the frequency stability of an external reference source. An RSFQ circuit comprised of a ring oscillator, a divide-by-2 20 prescaler and a resynchronizer D flip-flop was fabricated using the standard 1 kA cm -2 niobium foundry service from Hypres. The circuit was stabilized using a low-frequency PLL with a bandwidth of 6 Hz. The output of the phase detector in the PLL was used to produce a feedback current that stabilized the frequency of the ring oscillator at around 8 GHz. The frequency spectrum of the RSFQ scaled oscillator output was measured in open- and closed-loop configurations. Compared to the open-loop phase noise spectrum the closed-loop spectrum showed a decrease of 30 dB of the oscillator phase noise at an offset of 1 Hz from the divided-down carrier frequency of 4.1 kHz. This agreed with the classical phase-locked loop model for the system. The long-term frequency drift of the RSFQ clock was determined by the stability of the oven-controlled quartz oscillator used as the reference in the PLL.
We present a technique for linewidth measurement and phase-locking of Josephson oscillators using digital rapid single-flux-quantum (RSFQ) circuits. The oscillator consists of a resistively shunted 6 /spl mu/m/spl times/6 /spl mu/m Nb/AlO/sub x//Nb Josephson tunnel junction that is integrated with RSFQ input and output circuits. A cascade of RSFQ T flip-flops is used to directly monitor the output of the Josephson oscillator. Spectral characteristics have been measured directly for oscillator frequencies ranging from 10-50 GHz. The linewidth can be reduced by over 100 times by phase-locking the oscillator to an RSFQ pulse train generated by an external sinusoidal signal. These Josephson oscillators can be used as on-chip stable high frequency clocks for RSFQ circuits.
This paper discusses the possible modifications of the flux-flow oscillator, which is a part of an integrated receiver, for use as a precise clock oscillator in RSFQ circuits. At the price of losing tunability, the flux-flow oscillator can be used at resonance modes. To get higher clock rates, a parallel array of 20 identical under-damped Josephson junctions connected by superconducting micro-strip lines can also be used with an SIS mixer to form a phase-locked loop. The array shows a sharp resonance at 600 GHz, which can be used to make a precise on-chip clock. The linewidth of the emitted power of 150 kHz was estimated from the step differential resistance (free-run stability of 2.5 /spl middot/ 10/sup -7/). To convert frequency down to the desired level the array was matched to an over-damped pair of junctions, which form a precise frequency divider. The divider almost does not add any time jitter, thus the linewidth of 15 kHz can be achieved at 60 GHz. The clock stability can be improved by using an on-chip phase-locked-loop (PLL). The main part of the PLL is a phase detector, which can be based on an RSFQ Josephson sampler combined with an RSFQ fast counter. The suggested circuit probably could not compete with an SIS mixer, but significantly simplifies the circuit, and enables an on-chip RSFQ PLL closed by RSFQ frequency meter and DAC.
A clock recovery circuit has been successfully tested at frequencies up to 20 GHz. This cell is designed for a rapid-single-flux-quantum (RSFQ) telecommunication data switch. It serves to set the receiver clock in phase with the incoming digital signal. The circuit consists of a dc-to-SFQ converter, ring oscillator [(RO) is a closed-loop RSFQ Josephson transmission line], confluence buffer, and an 8-bit binary counter. The input signal transforms to SFQ pulses, and each pulse resets the phase of the ring oscillator, giving a locking time of 1 bit. Thus, the pull-in (capture) range and hold-in (tracking) range are the same, and strictly depend on the encoding of the input signal. This range is estimated to be about 1 GHz at frequency 20 GHz, if the sequence of consecutive ONEs or ZEROs does not exceed 20 bits. The quality factor QRO of ring oscillator is about 2000, which gives a jitter of 50 fs for a 35-junction RO. A sampling technique was used to demonstrate phase recovery (phase locking) with only one incoming pulse per 512 clock periods.
Superconducting digital technology based on Rapid Single Flux Quantum logic (RSFQ) is a digital technology characterized by high speed, low power consumption and low operational temperatures. RSFQ is attractive for many applications and in particular for high frequency Digital Signal Processing (DSP) and for digital control of mK devices like superconducting qubits. Due to the 30 GHz clock speed, RSFQ DSP could be used to implement a Successive Interference Canceller for multi-user detection in a 3G wireless systems. The being developed DSP consists of a digital core, an RSFQ Multiply Accumulate unit (MAC), RSFQ fast cache memory and external semiconductor memory.The first part of this thesis is focusing on architecture and implementation of the hierarchical CMOS-RSFQ hybrid memory for the RSFQ DSP. The architecture ofthe RSFQ cache is optimized in order to reach the highest speed and reliable data communication with CMOS memory. Aspects of block synchronization betweenthe RSFQ cache and the RSFQ digital core are discussed and solved using a new developed RSFQ gate, C3. For design of different components of the DSP, a designapproach based on validated VHDL models is proposed and experimentally verified.The second part of this thesis is focusing on the design oflow-dissipative RSFQ circuits for interface to the superconducting qubits. Power dissipation ofRSFQ circuits is minimized. A low-temperature thermal model of resistively shunted Josephsonjunctions is developed and applied to optimize the shape of the shunt resistors in order to reduce their electron temperature. Depending on the available fabricationprocess the lowest noise temperature of RSFQ circuit can be in the range from 90 mK to 180 mK.
Systems requiring multiple clock frequencies are becoming more common in digital superconductive electronics. In rapid single flux quantum (RSFQ) circuits, precise frequencies are applied to different clock domains. A diverse variety of SFQ clock generators have been employed to produce a single frequency. A clock generator that uses a single voltage source to deliver multiple frequencies is presented here. The operating principle, performance, area, and power of the proposed SFQ multi-clock generator are described. Previously published clock generators are limited to a fixed frequency or varied by changing the bias DC voltage—a parameter not typically changedin situ. In the proposed approach, the clock frequency is tunable by the SFQ logic circuit. In addition, a globally asynchronous locally synchronous system is presented to exemplify the practical application of the proposed multi-clock generator