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C. Debaes, A. Bhatnagar, D. Agarwal, R. Chen,
G. A. Keeler, N. C. Helman, H. Thienpont,
and D. A. B. Miller, "Receiver-less Optical Clock Injection for
Clock Distribution Networks,"
IEEE J.
Sel. Top. Quantum Electron. 9, 400-409 (2003)
We
present a new technique of injecting clocks optically onto CMOS chips
without the use of a receiver amplifier. We discuss the benefits of
such a direct approach and present proof-of-principle experiments of
the technique. We analytically compare a receiver-less optical clock
distribution and an electrical clock distribution in a fan-out-of-four
clock tree to evaluate the timing and power benefits of the optical
approach for present microprocessors. We also compare receiver-less
direct injection of optical clocks to trans-impedance receiver based
injection within the same distribution framework.
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