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Development of automatic frequency discriminators and control for phase lock loop providing frequency preset capabilities
Seven experiments are reported on low-frequency whole-body vibration and rats' escape conditioning in a modified Skinner box. In the first three studies, conditioning was observed but was independent of frequency. In experiment four, the number of escape responses was directly related to vibration amplitude. Experiment five was a control for vibration noise and noise termination; experiments six and seven studied vibration-induced activation. Noise termination did not produce conditioning. In experiment six, subjects made more responses when responding led to termination than when it did not. In experiment seven, subjects preferred a bar which terminated vibration to one which did not.
The specification and performance of precision oscillators is discussed as a very important topic to the owners and users of these oscillators. This paper presents at the tutorial level some convenient methods of measuring the frequencies of precision oscillators -- giving advantages and disadvantages of these methods. Further it is shown that by processing the data from the frequency measurements in certain ways, one may be able to state more general characteristics of the oscillators being measured. The goal in this regard is to allow the comparisons of different manufacturers' specifications and more importantly to help assess whether these oscillators will meet the standard of performance the user may have in a particular application.
The design concepts of a multibeam frequency-division multiplexed satellite system accessed by many moderately sized earth stations are outlined. In the system proposed here, traffic is routed from beam to beam through appropriate apportionment and filtering. Within a beam, the routing to particular users is achieved by conventional FDM. The optimum beam size, beam isolation, orthogonal polarization assignment to beams, the concept of beam groups yielding a simple transponder design, and the establishment of a frequency plan providing interference-free band assignments are discussed.
The general features of the Hg-199(+) trapped-ion frequency standard are outlined and compared to other atomic frequency standards, especially the hydrogen maser. The points discussed are those which make the trapped Hg-199(+) standard attractive: high line Q, reduced sensitivity to external magnetic fields, and simplicity of state selection, among others.
Highly reliable timing system, such as used on board satellites, may incorporate a hot standby atomic clock besides the active one. RF couplings between them may affect the performance of the active clock. The effect of such couplings between two rubidium atomic clocks was investigated, and it was found that they will add an oscillatory term to the Allan Variance of the active clock, degrading its frequency stability, and that under certain circumstances they may also shift the active clock's operating frequency. These two effects are discussed in detail, and the level of isolation required to render them negligible is established.
A novel approach to the reduction of scattered, interfering signals that corrupt measurements of the signal backscattered from radar targets of interest is being developed. It is being explored with sphere measurements in an indoor microwave radar range. This method is based on the concept of Wiener filtering (which minimizes the difference between the signal plus noise and the desired signal in the time domain). In contrast to the traditional Wiener filter, in which the time domain error between two sequences are minimized, the approach reported uses the frequency domain phasor amplitudes of a swept frequency signal. It minimizes the difference (least-mean-square-magnitude) between the signal-plus-noise and the signal complex phasors, across the entire spectrum.
Two different carrier frequencies modulated by a reference frequency are transmitted to each receiver to be synchronized therewith. Each receiver responds to local phase differences between the two received signals to correct the phase of one of them so as to maintain the corrected signal as a reliable synchronization reference.
The design and performance of a wide angle, single screen, frequency selective surface (FSS) with gridded square-loop path elements are described for diplexing closely separated signal bands, for example, X- and Ku-band signals in an Orbiting Very Long Baseline Interferometer (OVLBI) earth station reflector antenna system, as well as other applications such as military and commercial communications via satellites. Excellent agreement is obtained between the predicted and measured results of this FSS design using the gridded square-loop patch elements sandwiched between 0.0889 cm thick tetrafluoroethylene fluorocarbon polymer (PTFE) slabs. Resonant frequency drift is reduced by 1 GHz with an incidence angle from 0 deg normal to 40 deg from normal.
A three laser system based on 852nm DBR lasers has been constructed and used to generate radiation in the 750 GHz to 1600 GHz frequency region. The system works by locking two of the three lasers to modes of an ultra low expansion Fabry-Perot cavity. The third laser is offset locked to one of the cavity locked lasers with conventional microwave techniques. The signal from the offset laser and the other cavity locked laser are injected into a Master Oscillator Power Amplifier (MOPA), amplified and focused on a low temperature grown GaAs photomixer, which radiates the difference frequency. The system has been calibrated with molecular lines to better than one part in 10(exp 7). In this paper we present the application of this system to the v(sub 2) in inversion band of Ammonia and the ground and v(sub 2) states of water. A discussion of the system design, the calibration and the new spectral measurements will be presented.
Optical heterodyne experiments involving the photomixing of two single frequency, deode-pumped thulium holmium yttrium lithium flouride lasers are described. Operated in external frquency stabilization loops, the lasers exhibit 1MHz short term stability, and are photomixed and offset-locked at 140 MHz. Summation of sine wave modulation onto the PZT control voltage on one laser results in frequency swept operation over a continuous tuning range of 160 MHz.
A tracking generator 21 is slaved to a spectrum analyzer 23 to produce an input signal having a frequency that follows the frequency of the spectrum analyzer sweeping local oscillator 22. The input signal is gated to a transducer 26 by a transmitter gate 25 to produce ultrasonic waves in the sample 28. The resulting ultrasonic echoes are converted into electrical signals by the transducer and then gated into the spectrum analyzer by receiver gate 29. This arrangement produces spectra that are equivalent to shock-exciting the transducer with a true delta function shock-excitation.
Space plasmas support a wide variety of waves, and wave-particle interactions as well as wavewave interactions are of crucial importance to magnetospheric and ionospheric plasma behavior. High frequency wave turbulence generation by the low frequency (LF) turbulence is restricted by two interconnected requirements: the turbulence should be strong enough and/or the coherent wave trains should have the appropriate length. These requirements are strongly relaxed in the multi-component plasmas, due to the heavy ions large drift velocity in the field of LF wave. The excitation of lower hybrid waves (LHWs), in particular, is a widely discussed mechanism of interaction between plasma species in space and is one of the unresolved questions of magnetospheric multi-ion plasmas. It is demonstrated that large-amplitude Alfven waves, in particular those associated with LF turbulence, may generate LHW s in the auroral zone and ring current region and in some cases (particularly in the inner magnetosphere) this serves as the Alfven wave saturation mechanism. We also argue that the described scenario can playa vital role in various parts of the outer magnetosphere featuring strong LF turbulence accompanied by LHW activity. Using the data from THEMIS spacecraft, we validate the conditions for such cross-scale coupling in the near-Earth "flow-braking" magnetotail region during the passage of sharp injection/dipolarization fronts, as well as in the turbulent outflow region of the midtail reconnection site.
Reception threshold for wideband frequency modulation
Test facility for determining human performance in very low frequency noise environment - physiological and psychological responses
Short dipole antenna impedance measurements in ionosphere at observing frequency above electron gyrofrequency
Dual channel traveling wave hydrogen maser for frequency generation and control
Phase noise power spectral density, phase noise variance with time, and phase noise amplitude distribution for frequency synthesizers