Sascha Schediwy (University of Western Australia)

Synchronisation Across the Nation: Building a continental-scale optical fibre time and frequency distribution network -- Sascha Schediwy Colloquium

Abstract

Until recently, very long baseline interferometry with an array of radio telescopes required separate atomic clocks at each telescope site synchronised via satellite link. However, future instruments like the Square Kilometre Array are free to avoid these costly shackles.
The dissemination of time and frequency via optical fibre offers the potential for a thousand-fold increase in synchronisation stability as compared to the best satellite-based systems. Recently, a synchronisation stability of 1 part in 2×10^14 (at 1 s of integration) was achieved over a 920 km fibre link across Germany. However, much development is still required to evolve these early experimental links into fully-featured, deployable, dissemination networks that span continental scales.
In this talk, I will describe the work of our collaboration of around 15 researches, across 12 institutes, to create an Australian National Time and Frequency Network (NTFN). This network will support the development of many scientific, technological and commercial applications including; fundamental physics, optical spectroscopy, radio astronomy, geodesy, distributed computing, telecommunications, and the finance industry.
I will present some our collaboration’s recent results in the context of the Square Kilometre Array, and describe future work including a planned radio astronomy synchronisation experiment using the telescopes at Mopra and Narrabri.