Abstract

The use of optical techniques to generate and measure very fast electronic events is a challenging approach to high speed electronics with many important potential advantages relative to conventional electronic instrumentation.¹ Foremost among these advantages is the ability to achieve much greater speed. Additional features are the lack of jitter, extremely large dynamic range, optical interfaces, and the ability to synchronize high speed optical and electronic events. Although speeds of <1 psec have been demonstrated,² the full potential for applications of these techniques to the measurement of materials and devices has yet to be realized. A central difficulty is the problem of transmitting these extremely fast electrical signals between the points of generation and detection. For speeds slower than ~3 psec, carefully designed microstrip and coaxial transmission lines are adequate. However, in the range of speeds below 3 psec, this is no longer true, and alternative approaches are needed.

© 1984 Optical Society of America