[Pafgbt] Phased Array Coordination meeting

Anish Roshi anish.roshi at gmail.com
Thu Apr 11 07:46:17 EDT 2013


Hi Brian,

The discussion Rick has raised in the mail is based on some measurements I
made early April. Attached is a summary of these measurements. We see a
higher NF for the BYU receiver. Is this consistent with your earlier
measurements ? A possibility Rick raised is that the LO power level may be
low and so the mixer conversion loss may be high. Is it possible ?

Anish


On Wed, Apr 10, 2013 at 2:49 PM, Rick Fisher <rfisher at nrao.edu> wrote:

> Hi Anish,
>
> I think it would be good to put this discussion on 'pafgbt' so here goes.
>
> You are probably right that there's not much margin for adding attenuation
> at the output of the Dewar.  It depends on the noise figure of the
> amplifiers at the input of the fiber link package or, more accurately, the
> effective noise figure of the fiber link input.  This will be good to know,
> but for now we can probably assume that Roger designed the fiber link with
> just low enough noise figure to work with the Dewar design as he knew it.
>  This would be good to verify, however, once the uncertainty of the cold
> LNA integrity is resolved.
>
> Keep in mind that terminating the fiber link input adds 300K of noise to
> its input.  Hence, if the noise figure of the fiber link input amplifiers
> is better than 3 dB, you're more than doubling its noise power with the
> termination.
>
>
> Rick
>
> On Tue, 9 Apr 2013, Anish Roshi wrote:
>
>
>> Hi Rick, Bob,
>>
>> It looks like the disagreement is in the measured noise figure and
>> estimate
>> noise figure of BYU receiver.  May be we can repeat the noise figure
>> measurement of BYU receiver. Bob, would you mind measuring the output
>> noise
>> spectrum of BYU receiver after terminating its input for couple of boards
>> with a spectrum analyzer.
>>
>>
>> Regarding putting the attenuator between A and B -- won't it reduce the
>> noise margin of cold sky signal ? With the current gain, the cold sky
>> signal
>> is about 20 dB above the noise level when terminated.
>>
>> ------------------------------**-----
>>
>> I checked the noise due to the first stage op-amp LMH6639. The voltage
>> noise
>> from the spec is 16 nV/sqrt(Hz). The source impedance I have taken as 50
>> Ohms (ie the mixed output impedance) and so I neglected the noise due to
>> the
>> current source. The noise power is -143 dBm/Hz and reference at the input
>> with 23 dB gain ahead of op-amp is -163 dBm/Hz -- comparable to the noise
>> due to the first stage !! Does this make sense ?
>>
>> Anish
>>
>>
>> On Tue, Apr 9, 2013 at 4:09 PM, Rick Fisher <rfisher at nrao.edu> wrote:
>>       Hi Anish,
>>
>>       >From your short write up, the noise temperature at the output
>>       of the fiber link (point C) with the link input (B) terminated
>>       is about 3e6 Kelvin. This says that either the input noise
>>       figure of the fiber link is much higher than 300 K or the net RF
>>       gain of the link is nearly 40 dB, or some combination of the
>>       two.  Judging by the noise figure and insertion loss specs on
>>       the input components of the BYU receiver it seems unlikely that
>>       its net input noise temperature is much greater than about 1000
>>       K, unless something has failed or an LO has been set to the
>>       wrong frequency or power level.
>>
>>       Your noise measurement at the output of the BYU receiver (E)
>>       with the fiber link output connected to the BYU receiver input
>>       shows a net gain in the receiver of about 66 dB (133.7 dBm/Hz -
>>       67.7 dBm/Hz).  This would suggest that the receiver is working
>>       more or less correctly.
>>
>>       For the sake of argument, let's say that the gain in the Dewar
>>       is 40 dB, the net gain if the fiber link is 35 db, and the BYU
>>       receiver gain is 66 dB for a total gain of 141 dB.  With 300 K
>>       connected to the Dewar input (array looking at the hot load) the
>>       receiver output power density would be 141 - 174 = -33 dBm/Hz.
>>        The BYU receiver output bandwidth is about 600 kHz so its
>>       output power would be +24.8 dBm or about 3.9 Vrms, which is far
>>       more than the ADC wants or needs and more than the BYU receiver
>>       can deliver.  Hence, there's way too much total gain in the
>>       system.
>>
>>       Where to add attenuation is determined by a balance between the
>>       need to dominate the noise of the system on the down-stream side
>>       of the attenuator when looking at cold sky and the requirement
>>       that all stages of the system be well within their linear
>>       operating range when looking at the hot load. My guess is that
>>       this attenuation should be divided between the A-B junction and
>>       the C-D junction since the BYU receiver output level is
>>       reasonably well matched to the ADC level requirements, judging
>>       by previous experience.
>>
>>       The ADC range is +/-1 V with 12-bit resolution so one ADC level
>>       spacing is 2.0 / 4096 = 0.49 mV, and the minimum voltage level
>>       presented to the ADC when looking at cold sky should be about 2
>>       mV rms into a 50 ohm load, and the maximum should be about 200
>>       mV rms when looking at the hot load. Hence, a good level for the
>>       ADC input is between -1 and -41 dBm
>>
>>       Someone should check my figures.
>>
>>       Rick
>>
>>       On Tue, 9 Apr 2013, Anish Roshi wrote:
>>
>>
>>             Hi All,
>>
>>             Attached is a short write up on the measurements
>>             done on the PAF system.
>>             Anish
>>
>>
>>             On Mon, Apr 8, 2013 at 4:59 PM, Bill Shillue
>>             <bshillue at nrao.edu> wrote:
>>                   Meeting tomorrow Tues April 8th
>>
>>                   Phased Array Coordination
>>
>>                   9.30--10.30  NTC-200 and GB-137 by video
>>
>>                   topics:
>>
>>                   1. Data from last week (Anish).  Discussion of
>>             power levels and
>>                   other issues (see Anish email)
>>                   2. Testing schedule going forward
>>                   3. Cornell tests indefinitely postponed
>>                   4. Dates for testing with BYU backend (2nd
>>             half of May ?)
>>                   5. Australia travel: travel is being setup.
>>              Waiting for NDA.
>>                    Presentation needed.
>>                   6. Summary of meeting with Tony Beasley
>>                   7. Summary from David on setting up Roach
>>             testbed
>>                   8. Other
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>                   -----Original Message-----
>>                   From: Bill Shillue
>>                   Sent: Monday, March 25, 2013 4:28 PM
>>                   To: Rick Fisher (rfisher at nrao.edu); Anish
>>             Roshi; Steven White;
>>                   Robert Simon (bsimon at nrao.edu); Michael
>>             Shannon; Matthew Morgan
>>                   (mmorgan2 at nrao.edu); DAVID SAROFF (RIT
>>             Student)
>>                   (dps7802 at rit.edu)
>>                   Subject: Phased Array Coordination meeting
>>
>>                   Our usual meeting time of 9.30--10.30 is
>>             impacted tomorrow by a
>>                   Division head meeting starting at 10 am GB137
>>
>>                   So we'll cover as much ground as we can before
>>             10 am.
>>
>>                   We'll start with testing status (Anish) and
>>             Cornell/BYU tests
>>
>>                   Bill
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
> _______________________________________________
> Pafgbt mailing list
> Pafgbt at listmgr.cv.nrao.edu
> http://listmgr.cv.nrao.edu/mailman/listinfo/pafgbt
>
>
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://listmgr.nrao.edu/pipermail/pafgbt/attachments/20130411/c3ba3f0e/attachment.html>
-------------- next part --------------
A non-text attachment was scrubbed...
Name: april32013.pdf
Type: application/pdf
Size: 201355 bytes
Desc: not available
URL: <http://listmgr.nrao.edu/pipermail/pafgbt/attachments/20130411/c3ba3f0e/attachment.pdf>


More information about the Pafgbt mailing list