Skip to main content
Search

Company Blog

Noise Analysis of Signal Components

29.03.2017

Noise PSD

In this blog post, we investigate the relation between the noise of signal amplitude and phase on one hand, and the noise of in-phase and quadrature components of the signal on the other hand. We try to respond to the wrong intuition stating that the standard deviation of signal amplitude is higher than the standard deviation of each signal components...

RF Reflectometry Measurements of Quantum Dots

20.02.2017

Coulomb Diamonds

Characterizing semiconductor spin qubits with radio-frequency (RF) reflectometry offers a speed advantage over low-frequency conductance measurements thanks to insensitivity to 1/f noise. In this blog post, the measurements of Josip Kukučka and his colleagues...

Compensating Delay-Induced Phase Shifts for High-Frequency Resonators

20.02.2017

Compensation Delay Schematic

Phase-locked loops (PLL) or other PID controllers on nano-mechanical resonators rely on clean phase signals that exhibit large slope, or significant phase shift, around the resonance frequency. For really high-frequency NEMS and opto-mechanical systems above a few tens or hundreds of MHz, any small delay can have significant effect on...

Time-Domain Response of Lock-in Filters

09.02.2017

Impulse Response

The heart of a lock-in amplifier is a phase-sensitive detector that includes a signal mixer and a low-pass filter. In this blog post, we focus on the time response of the low-pass filters implemented in the Zurich Instruments lock-in amplifiers including the MFLI, the HF2LI and the UHFLI...

The Nyquist Diagram for Electrical Circuits

11.01.2017

Schematic

The Nyquist diagram of a transfer function is a parametric plot of its imaginary part versus real part as the frequency sweeps in a certain range. When dealing with electric circuits, the transfer function is the immittance of the circuit, i.e., it can be either the impedance or the admittance of the circuit...

Workshop on Nanomechanics

09.12.2016

Stiffness

This workshop organized with CNRS customers in Montpellier among the RéMiSoL network (Réseau des Microscopies à Sondes Locales) focused on all aspects of contact mechanics at the nanoscale and in particular using resonant contact AFM mode (CR-AFM). Contact resonance tracking measures the shift in resonance frequencies of the cantilever while...

Frequency Response Measurement with Chirps and Leakage-Free FFT

28.10.2016

Good Chirp Setup

This post explains how to measure the frequency response of a component or system with high spectral resolution in a minimum amount of time. Rather than sweeping the frequency and recording each spectral point individually, the approach presented here is based on a fast and continuous change of the frequency...

Better Amplitude Accuracy with the MFLI Analog Adder

07.03.2016

HF Output Add

Many lock-in applications use a drive signal consisting of a small AC excitation voltage and larger DC offset voltage, for example differential conductance (dI/dV) measurements. Users of the MFLI Lock-in Amplifier have the choice between two methods to generate such a signal: using the analog adder ("Add"), or using digital...

Using Digital Lines as Trigger Sources

03.02.2016

Save Demod Data on Trigger High

Starting from the LabOne 15.11 release, accessible from our Download Center , all HF2LI users with the enabled HF2LI-WEB option can now benefit from the latest software developments that were previously reserved for the UHFLI. One tool that is now totally new for this instrument is the Software (SW) Trigger...

Characterizing the ESR of a Supercapacitor with the MFIA

11.01.2016

MFIA with SuperCap

Supercapacitors are very useful devices providing power for applications ranging from SRAM to high-speed trains. The energy density is 10 - 100 times higher than that of standard (electrolytic) capacitors. And although they have a lower energy density than lithium-ion batteries, they have a much higher power density...

Eddy Current Testing with the MFLI Lock-in Amplifier

05.08.2015

Eddy current

This blog post describes a method to detect material defects. Eddy current measurements are used for non-destructive material testing (NDT). An alternating magnetic field is penetrating a sample. The material defect is detected by a phase shift. Experimental Setup

Optimizing PLL Performance with PID Advisor and Auto Tune

27.07.2015

Loop block diagram

LabOne provides two tools that save time and improve performance for anybody working with the UHF-PID option: the PID Advisor and the Auto Tune feature. They enable automation of the feedback parameter tuning required to achieve the best PID (proportional-integral-derivative) controller performance. In this blog post, we'll show you an example that demonstrates the power of both of these tools...

Contact Us