No longer stuck in the neck, chip atomic clock

"Dida" "Dida"... In daily life, the accuracy of a clock depends on the regular swing of the pendulum. But no matter how high the clock accuracy is, there will still be an error of about 1 minute per year. Although it has no impact on daily life, more accurate timing tools are needed in production and scientific research that require high time accuracy.

At present, the most accurate timing tool in the world is the atomic clock, which can achieve an accuracy of 1 second every 20 million years. Recently, the first chip atomic clock production line in China was completed and put into operation at Tianjin Huaxintai Technology Co., Ltd., an enterprise in Tianjin Binhai High tech Zone. The annual production capacity of this production line can reach 30000 units. Its production indicates that China has broken foreign monopolies in the field of chip atomic clocks, overcome the bottleneck problem of key components, and meet the urgent needs of related fields.

Chip atomic clock with small size, high accuracy, and low power consumption

Atomic clocks use electromagnetic waves emitted by atoms when absorbing or releasing energy to achieve timing. This type of electromagnetic wave is very stable, and with the control of a series of precision instruments, it ensures the accuracy of atomic clock timing. The elements currently used in atomic clocks include hydrogen, cesium, rubidium, etc.

Initially, atomic clocks were instruments created by physicists to explore the essence of the universe. However, with the advancement of science and technology, the importance of time-frequency accuracy is becoming increasingly prominent, and atomic clocks that sound high-end are also becoming more down-to-earth. For example, the well-known Beijing time is the result of more than 150 atomic clocks around the world jointly keeping time and weighted average. Various power and communication systems cannot do without high-precision atomic clocks.

However, due to its large size, high power consumption, and high price, atomic clocks have not truly entered the general electronic consumer market.

"The emergence of chip atomic clocks has solved this problem, with small size, low power consumption, high accuracy, and mass production, effectively filling the market gap of traditional atomic clocks." Huaxintai Chairman Liang Xiaopeng introduced that chip atomic clocks are a new type of atomic clock manufactured using the coherent layout trapping principle of quantum physics. As microwave resonant cavity devices are no longer needed, they can truly achieve miniaturization.

Compared to traditional atomic clocks, chip atomic clocks are currently the only atomic clocks that can be powered by batteries and operate for long periods of time. As a core foundational device in the field of time and frequency technology in electronic information technology, chip atomic clocks have broad application prospects, ranging from aerospace, satellite navigation, to communication, seabed exploration, the Internet of Things and other fields.

Breaking Foreign Monopoly and Realizing Independent Innovation

Chip atomic clock is a high-precision timing device with a very complex manufacturing process. Before the launch of the Huaxintai chip atomic clock production line, only one American company in the world had achieved large-scale production of chip atomic clocks. At that time, domestic users wanted to purchase foreign chip atomic clocks, and it was common for them to "cannot afford" and "not easy to buy".

To break this monopoly, Huaxintai's R&D team has been responsible for the development of the chip atomic clock project since 2010.

"The chip atomic clock is a typical combination of microsystem technology and quantum physics, which is interdisciplinary and cross disciplinary, involving many fields such as physics, chemistry, and materials, and has great research and development difficulties. The main technical difficulties are concentrated in vacuum packaging and microsystem integration technology." Liang Xiaopeng gave an example, for example, in the research and development of vacuum packaging, they have made hundreds of attempts, repeatedly adjusting the structural design, comparing and experimenting with material selection and temperature settings, and continuously improving process conditions, in order to finally achieve the current high yield packaging effect.

Liang Xiaopeng pointed to the chip atomic clock, which is even smaller than the commonly used small alarm clock in the family, and said that Huaxin Tai Li Shi has been researching for 10 years, dedicated to tackling problems, and through independent research and development, has broken through the key technology of chip atomic clocks. All the chip atomic clock products produced have independent intellectual property rights.

Chip atomic clocks not only need to achieve technological breakthroughs, but also have the ability to achieve mass production. "When conducting underwater oil exploration, it may be necessary to place thousands of chip atomic clocks on the seabed exploration nodes, which requires us to have the ability to produce on a large scale." Liu Ruiyuan, General Manager of Huaxintai, said, "Our exploration of large-scale production processes is also starting from scratch, such as the vacuum packaging process and SMT process of chip atomic clocks, with precision reaching the micrometer level. A slight difference can lead to a decrease in product stability and consistency."

After 4 years, Huaxintai completed the process exploration of large-scale production. This manufacturing method has particularly stringent requirements for software and hardware environments such as factory space and supporting facilities. In order to accelerate the industrialization and landing speed of the company's chip atomic clock, starting from 2021, Tianjin Binhai High tech Zone, guided by the concept of "Party building leading and co creating", conducted multiple rounds of docking with the Huaxintai team on site selection issues, and finally found a factory that combines geographical transportation advantages, factory height advantages, and factory supporting facilities advantages to land.

In the factory building, 8 sets of large-scale equipment, including power supply equipment, air purification equipment, and wastewater and exhaust gas treatment equipment, occupy about two-thirds of the factory area, and all of these equipment serve the 400 square meter clean room used for production.

The first chip atomic clock production line in China is composed of lithography machines, vacuum packaging machines, deep silicon etching machines, and other equipment. It can achieve a complete production process of chip atomic clock components production and testing, physical system vacuum packaging, and chip atomic clock performance testing, with an annual production capacity of 10000 units.

The mass production of chip atomic clocks can drive the development of other industries

Although the chip atomic clock may not be large in size, it used to be expensive when relying on imports. "After the production line is completed, large-scale production can significantly reduce the cost of chip atomic clocks," Liu Ruiyuan told Science and Technology Daily reporters.

The mass production of chip atomic clocks has also driven the development of many industries. For example, it can promote the application of underwater exploration nodes, thereby revolutionizing China's underwater oil exploration.

Liang Xiaopeng gave an example that during oil exploration, tens of thousands of OBNs with chip atomic clocks as core components can be deployed on the seabed, and each node strictly requires time synchronization. Moreover, the deployment time at the seabed is relatively long, and the dependence on batteries is high. The low power consumption of chip atomic clocks can precisely meet this requirement. The use of OBN with chip atomic clocks as the core device for exploration is more cost-effective and accurate than traditional exploration methods, and further expands the exploration area.

Liang Xiaopeng said, "The production of this production line not only marks a breakthrough in China's long monopolized chip atomic clock 'bottleneck' technology, but more importantly, the successful industrialization of technological products. Next, we will further expand production capacity according to production and application needs. In the near future, the company will build an annual production line of 100000 or even one million units. In terms of research and development, we will also closely follow international and domestic trends, upgrade our products, constantly update and replace them, launch more advanced, smaller, and lower power consumption products, and strive to be at the forefront of the world."