dorsal/arxiv
View SchemaFlicker noise in high-speed p-i-n photodiodes
| Authors | Enrico Rubiola, Ertan Salik, Nan Yu, Lute Maleki |
|---|---|
| Categories | |
| ArXiv ID | physics/0503022 |
| URL | https://arxiv.org/abs/physics/0503022 |
| DOI | 10.1109/TMTT.2005.863062 |
| Journal | IEEE Transact. Microw. Theory Techn. (Special issue on Microwave Photonics, joint with J. Lightwave Techn.), vol. 54 no. 2 pp. 816-820, February 2006 |
Abstract
The microwave signal at the output of a photodiode that detects a modulated optical beam contains the phase noise phi(t) and the amplitude noise alpha(t) of the detector. Beside the white noise, which is well understood, the spectral densities S_phi(f) and S_alpha(f) show flicker noise, proportional to 1/f. We report on the measurement of the phase and amplitude noise of high-speed p-i-n photodiodes. The main result is that the flicker coefficient of the samples is approximately 1E-12 rad^2/Hz (-120dB) for phase noise, and approximately 1E-12 Hz^-1 (-120dB) for amplitude noise. These values could be observed only after solving a number of experimental problems and in a protected environment. By contrast, in ordinary conditions insufficient EMI isolation, and also insufficient mechanical isolation, are responsible for additional noise to be taken in. This suggests that if package and EMC are revisited, applications can take the full benefit from the surprisingly low noise of the p-i-n photodiodes.
{
"annotation_id": "60b51dbb-c10d-44b4-8ff2-94ffc2c5159c",
"date_created": "2026-03-02T18:00:57.391000Z",
"date_modified": "2026-03-02T18:00:57.391000Z",
"file_hash": "0ac0566ebdb50c6333f2bb1b53ebf2c6bb17729b8d406d37c07008c8bd1f8712",
"private": false,
"record": {
"abstract": "The microwave signal at the output of a photodiode that detects a modulated\noptical beam contains the phase noise phi(t) and the amplitude noise alpha(t)\nof the detector. Beside the white noise, which is well understood, the spectral\ndensities S_phi(f) and S_alpha(f) show flicker noise, proportional to 1/f.\n We report on the measurement of the phase and amplitude noise of high-speed\np-i-n photodiodes. The main result is that the flicker coefficient of the\nsamples is approximately 1E-12 rad^2/Hz (-120dB) for phase noise, and\napproximately 1E-12 Hz^-1 (-120dB) for amplitude noise. These values could be\nobserved only after solving a number of experimental problems and in a\nprotected environment. By contrast, in ordinary conditions insufficient EMI\nisolation, and also insufficient mechanical isolation, are responsible for\nadditional noise to be taken in. This suggests that if package and EMC are\nrevisited, applications can take the full benefit from the surprisingly low\nnoise of the p-i-n photodiodes.",
"arxiv_id": "physics/0503022",
"authors": [
"Enrico Rubiola",
"Ertan Salik",
"Nan Yu",
"Lute Maleki"
],
"categories": [
"physics.ins-det",
"physics.optics"
],
"doi": "10.1109/TMTT.2005.863062",
"journal_ref": "IEEE Transact. Microw. Theory Techn. (Special issue on Microwave\n Photonics, joint with J. Lightwave Techn.), vol. 54 no. 2 pp. 816-820,\n February 2006",
"title": "Flicker noise in high-speed p-i-n photodiodes",
"url": "https://arxiv.org/abs/physics/0503022"
},
"schema_id": "dorsal/arxiv",
"source": {
"execution_id": "67d6a9ad-7491-4752-935c-81a905d064c2",
"id": "arXiv Dataset IDs",
"type": "Model",
"variant": "snapshot-2026-03-01",
"version": "0.1.0"
},
"user_id": 1000002
}