Ultra-stable Oscillator Research Articles

The structure of Titan's atmosphere from Cassini radio occultations: One- and two-way occultations

We present the results of the remaining ten soundings of Titan's atmosphere by radio occultations using the Cassini spacecraft that have not been previously reported. Three were in 2008 and 2009, and used the Ultra Stable Oscillator onboard the spacecraft. The rest were in 2014 and 2016 after the USO had failed and were executed in two-way mode. Comparison of the later soundings with those earlier in the Cassini mission provide an indication of the seasonal change at mid latitudes. The southern hemisphere has shown a dramatic cooling during the onset of autumn; change in the northern hemisphere is noticeable, but more subdued. Changes at low latitudes are even smaller. The additional retrievals from 2008 to 2009 add a better constraint on the latitude structure of the previously reported destabilization of the temperature profiles at northern latitudes during winter and early spring. They show that the most pronounced effect is at polar latitudes (>70 N), suggesting that they are associated with the descending circulation over the winter pole that has been proposed by several authors. The full set of occultations indicates minimal variation with latitude and time in the troposphere, likely attributable to the large atmospheric radiative damping time and efficient meridional heat transports, but somewhat more variation near the surface, which has a smaller thermal inertia.

Compact and ultrastable photonic microwave oscillator.

Frequency comb synthesized microwaves have been so far realized with tabletop systems, operated in well-controlled environments. Here, we demonstrate state-of-the-art ultrastable microwave synthesis with a compact rack-mountable apparatus. We present absolute phase noise characterization of a 12 GHz signal using an ultrastable laser at $\sim{194}\;{\rm THz}$∼194THz and an Er:fiber comb divider, obtaining $ - {83}\;{\rm dBc/Hz}$-83dBc/Hz at 1 Hz and $ \lt - {166}\;{\rm dBc/Hz}$<-166dBc/Hz for offsets greater than 5 kHz. Employing semiconductor coating mirrors for the same type of transportable optical frequency reference, we show that $ - {105}\;{\rm dBc/Hz}$-105dBc/Hz at 1 Hz is supported by demonstrating a residual noise limit of division and detection process of $ - {115}\;{\rm dBc/Hz}$-115dBc/Hz at 1 Hz. This level of fidelity paves the way for the deployment of ultrastable photonic microwave oscillators and for operating transportable optical clocks.

Augmenting NASA Europa Clipper by a small probe: Europa Tomography Probe (ETP) mission concept

The Jupiter's moon Europa is believed to be one of the few bodies in the Solar System able to host habitable environments. Compelling evidence for the existence of a subsurface ocean was provided by the magnetic field measurements carried out by the Galileo spacecraft.The NASA/JPL Europa Clipper mission is scheduled for launch in the early 2020s. Due to the harsh Jovian radiation environment and budget limitations, the initial concept of an orbiter was abandoned, and the spacecraft will perform only multiple flybys of the moon. Although Clipper will investigate the surface and subsurface properties with a powerful suite of instruments, such approach is not very favourable to a thorough investigation of Europa's deep interior structure.In 2015 the Europa Clipper project announced the possibility to carry an additional flight element with a mass of about 250 kg. We then started investigating a smallest mission aimed at regaining the original science objectives of Clipper for studying the deep interior structure of Europa. Although this additional mass is no longer available, we describe here a mission concept, based on a mothercraft-daughtercraft configuration, which could be of interest to future exploration missions. Our proposal is based on a small spacecraft, the Europa Tomography Probe (ETP), to be inserted in a polar orbit around Europa with a lifetime of a few months. ETP should carry only a magnetometer and a transponder for inter-satellite link, thus not foreseeing any direct link to ground. By exploiting the magnetic induction effect from Jupiter, the magnetometer will measure Europa's magnetic polarizability, thus providing information on the thickness and conductivity of the internal salty ocean, while the ETP transponder will enable a two-way relay link with the mother spacecraft during Europa flybys. The relay link will be used to transfer telemetry data and to carry out range rate measurements on board Clipper. This configuration minimizes the required power on ETP and provides high quality Doppler observables using an ultra-stable oscillator hosted on Clipper. The limiting noise in Doppler measurements will be the frequency stability of ETP and Clipper relay electronics. Doppler data allow the determination of Europa's static gravity field with high resolution along with its variable part due to eccentricity tides (Love number k2). Measurements of the moon's gravity also provide accurate data on its rotational state (e.g., Europa's obliquity and libration amplitude). Furthermore, the inter-satellite Doppler observables can improve the accuracy in the determination of Clipper's position relative to Europa at the level of a few meters in the radial direction. The precise positioning of the main spacecraft relative to Europa and the altimetric measurements from the radar REASON could be exploited to measure the tidal displacement (Love number h2) of the outer icy shell.The NASA's Europa Clipper is viewed as the first applicable study case for the mission concept presented in this paper, which is of general interest to a class of similar flyby missions that can be conceived not only for the Jovian system, but also for Saturn and the ice giants of the solar system, Uranus and Neptune. In the latter case, for example, a small orbiter of Triton could significantly boost the science return from a larger spacecraft focusing on the observation of the planet. In the case of Europa, we show that joint magnetic field, gravity, and possibly altimetric measurements, will place strong constraints on the deep interior structure of the moon and provide a good determination of the ice shell thickness and ocean depth.

Bistatic Radar Occultations of Planetary Surfaces

Assessing the variability of surface roughness on planetary bodies is crucial for understanding the physical mechanisms that have governed their surface evolution. In addition, it provides constraints on surface texture uncertainties associated with landing, anchoring, surface trafficability, and sampling. Herein, we present how orbital bistatic radar (BSR) observations can be successfully conducted during occultations, and thereby used to achieve the above scientific and technical objectives for key planetary bodies that are under investigation by current and future missions. For different planetary bodies without dense atmospheres, we calculate the theoretical differential Doppler shift ( $\delta f$ ) between the direct and surface-scattered signals that precede and follow radio occultations during opportunistic BSR experiments. For occultations that last ~ 10 min, we find that small bodies with diameters $\pmb {\lesssim }100$ km will exhibit $\vert \delta f\vert ~\pmb {\lesssim } 5$ Hz, and larger bodies with diameters $\pmb {\gtrsim }500$ km will have $\vert \delta f\vert ~\pmb {\gtrsim }50$ Hz. Our results suggest that opportunistic BSR observations of targets $\pmb {\lesssim }100$ km in diameter will require an ultrastable oscillator (USO) aboard the spacecraft to retrieve surface echoes and constrain surface roughness.

Future of Planetary Atmospheric, Surface, and Interior Science Using Radio and Laser Links

AbstractScientific studies using spacecraft radio links, which are shared with communications and navigation functions, have been carried out on almost every solar system exploration mission in the past five decades. They have led to numerous scientific discoveries as well as technological advances. These radio science experiments have investigated the interior structure of every planet in the solar system and several of their satellites, the Moon, and several comets and asteroids and sounded the atmospheres of every planet in the solar system except Mercury, and the atmospheres of Pluto and several large satellites, the Io Plasma Torus, Saturn's and Uranus' rings, and the solar corona. Future experiments at Mercury, the Jovian system, asteroid Psyche, and other targets are currently in various planning and development phases. Over the next 30 years, significant advances in radio and laser link science technologies, including one order of magnitude improvement achievable in range rate and range accuracy and advanced calibration techniques, could enable many additional scientific breakthroughs. Future exploration concepts focus on applications of small spacecraft and entry probes and can include constellations for studies of atmospheric dynamics, interior structures, and surface properties. Selected science‐enabling technologies specific to small spacecraft instrumentation on future missions are under study. Examples include field tests of radio scattering to determine surface properties, constellations for high‐resolution spatial and temporal atmospheric sounding, small science‐quality software‐defined transponders, miniature ultrastable oscillators, and advanced radio‐metric calibrations at the Deep Space Network.

Probing 10\u2009\u03bcK stability and residual drifts in the cross-polarized dual-mode stabilization of single-crystal ultrahigh-Q optical resonators

The thermal stability of monolithic optical microresonators is essential for many mesoscopic photonic applications such as ultrastable laser oscillators, photonic microwave clocks, and precision navigation and sensing. Their fundamental performance is largely bounded by thermal instability. Sensitive thermal monitoring can be achieved by utilizing cross-polarized dual-mode beat frequency metrology, determined by the polarization-dependent thermorefractivity of a single-crystal microresonator, wherein the heterodyne radio-frequency beat pins down the optical mode volume temperature for precision stabilization. Here, we investigate the correlation between the dual-mode beat frequency and the resonator temperature with time and the associated spectral noise of the dual-mode beat frequency in a single-crystal ultrahigh-Q MgF2 resonator to illustrate that dual-mode frequency metrology can potentially be utilized for resonator temperature stabilization reaching the fundamental thermal noise limit in a realistic system. We show a resonator long-term temperature stability of 8.53 μK after stabilization and unveil various sources that hinder the stability from reaching sub-μK in the current system, an important step towards compact precision navigation, sensing, and frequency reference architectures.

Flicker Noise in Quartz Crystal Resonator at 353K as a Function of Q-Factor of Overtones and Anharmonic Modes at 4K

The unclear physical origin of flicker noise in ultra-stable quartz oscillators is still limiting some practical metrological applications. In this paper, we study experimentally the possible correlations between Q-factor measurements at low temperature (4[Formula: see text]K) and the level of flicker noise at nominal operating temperature (353[Formula: see text]K). Results for 10 Stress-Compensated-cut (SC-cut) resonators with a 5[Formula: see text]MHz resonant frequency and different noise levels (some excellent) are presented and commented, for several overtones and anharmonic modes.

Time-delay interferometry and clock-noise calibration

The Laser Interferometer Space Antenna is a joint ESA-NASA space-mission to detect and study mHz cosmic gravitational waves. The trajectories followed by its three spacecraft result in unequal- and time-varying arms, requiring use of the Time-Delay Interferometry (TDI) post- processing technique to cancel the laser phase noises affecting the heterodyne one-way Doppler measurements. Although the second-generation formulation of TDI cancels the laser phase noises when the array is both rotating and "flexing", second-generation TDI combinations for which the phase fluctuations of the onboard ultra stable oscillators (USOs) can be calibrated out have not appeared yet in the literature. In this article we present the solution of this problem by generalizing to the realistic LISA trajectory the USO calibration algorithm derived by Armstrong, Estabrook and Tinto for a static configuration.

Long-Term Behavior of the DORIS Oscillator Under Radiation: The Jason-2 Case.

This paper discusses the issues of radiation exposure that especially occur on the Doppler Orbitography and Radiopositioning Integrated on Satellite (DORIS) ultrastable oscillator (USO) that has been placed on the Jason-2 oceanography mission as the reference clock. We have studied the frequency response of the Jason-2 USO (launched in June 2008, at 66° of inclination and 1336 km of altitude) over 8.5 years. This is the only mission that provides different sources of data, internal and external, which permit a precise description of the oscillator behavior using several assumptions. While the ICARE-NG instrument provided continuous measurement of the electron and the proton fluxes, the Time Transfer by Laser Link (T2L2) experiment demonstrated its ability to monitor the "reading" of the oscillator at a level of a few parts in 10-13 with respect to a ground network of laser stations equipped with atomic clocks. From these inputs, and also environmental parameters such as the orbit, the attitude law of the platform, and the temperature of the oscillator, we have developed a complete physical model of the DORIS USO that fits the data at less than slightly below the threshold of 10-12 that limits the use of the DORIS data in current space geodesy analyses. In this way, the model also makes it possible to provide an assessment of the new Jason-3 USO to radiation effects after the satellite launch in January 2016.

Using the Deep Space Atomic Clock for Navigation and Science.

Routine use of one-way radiometric tracking for deep space navigation and radio science is not possible today because spacecraft frequency and time references that use state-of-the-art ultrastable oscillators introduce errors from their intrinsic drift and instability on timescales past 100 s. The Deep Space Atomic Clock (DSAC), currently under development as a NASA Technology Demonstration Mission, is an advanced prototype of a space-flight suitable, mercury-ion atomic clock that can provide an unprecedented frequency and time stability in a space-qualified clock. Indeed, the ground-based results of the DSAC space demonstration unit have already achieved an Allan deviation of at one day; space performance on this order will enable the use of one-way radiometric signals for deep space navigation and radio science.

Analysis of South Atlantic Anomaly perturbations on Sentinel-3A Ultra Stable Oscillator. Impact on DORIS phase measurement and DORIS station positioning

DORIS measurements rely on the precise knowledge of the embedded oscillator which is called the Ultra Stable Oscillator (DORIS USO). The important radiations in the South Atlantic Anomaly (SAA) perturb the USO behavior by causing rapid frequency variations when the satellite is flying through the SAA. These variations are not taken into account in standard DORIS processing, since the USO is modelled as a third degree polynomial over 7–10 days. Therefore, there are systematic measurements errors when the satellite passes through SAA. In standard GNSS processing, the clock is directly estimated at each epoch.On Sentinel-3A, the GPS receiver and the DORIS receiver use the same USO. It is thus possible to estimate the behavior of the USO using GPS measurements. This estimated USO behavior can be used in the DORIS processing, instead of the third degree polynomial, hence allowing an estimation of the orbit sensitivity to these USO anomalies.This study shows two main results. First, the SAA effect on the DORIS USO is observed well using GPS measurements. Second, the USO behavior observed with GPS can be used to mitigate the SAA effect.Indeed, when used in Sentinel-3A processing, the resulting DORIS orbit shows improved phase measurements and station positioning for stations inside the SAA (Arequipa and Cachoeira). The phase measurements residuals are improved by up to 10 cm, and station vertical positioning (i.e. on the estimated Up component in the North-East-Up station frame) is improved by up to a few centimeters. However, the orbit itself is not sensitive to the correction because only two stations (out of almost 60) are SAA-sensitive on Sentinel-3A.

Effects of the Langatate crystal quality on the resonance frequency stability of bulk acoustic wave resonators

ABSTRACTIn the time and frequency domain, we need ultrastable crystal resonators embedded in Ultra Stable Oscillators (USO), working at 10 MHz and exhibiting excellent short-term stabilities. Up to now, the quartz crystal fulfils its function. But, Langatate La3Ga5.5Ta0.5O14 (LGT) piezoelectric crystal seems to allow better performances with high quality material. The applications of this domain require high-quality material with reproducible properties. The LGT crystal is grown by the Czochralski method. Its physical and chemical properties and specificities of this growth process induce defects. They can react as ionic and electronic charge carriers and generate conductive losses. To assess the quality of the LGT crystal, we recorded the UV–VIS and IR transmission spectra and measured the electrical resistivity. At least, Y-cut resonators have been designed and manufactured to study the quality of the 10 MHz resonance, particularly its Q-factor, directly linked to the stability of the USO. We studied the effect of air annealing on the resonance frequency quality.

Evaluation of atmospheric profiles derived from single- and zero-difference excess phase processing of BeiDou radio occultation data from the FY-3C GNOS mission

Abstract. The Global Navigation Satellite System (GNSS) Occultation Sounder (GNOS) is one of the new-generation payloads onboard the Chinese FengYun 3 (FY-3) series of operational meteorological satellites for sounding the Earth's neutral atmosphere and ionosphere. The GNOS was designed for acquiring setting and rising radio occultation (RO) data by using GNSS signals from both the Chinese BeiDou System (BDS) and the US Global Positioning System (GPS). An ultra-stable oscillator with 1 s stability (Allan deviation) at the level of 10−12 was installed on the FY-3C GNOS, and thus both zero-difference and single-difference excess phase processing methods should be feasible for FY-3C GNOS observations. In this study we focus on evaluating zero-difference processing of BDS RO data vs. single-difference processing, in order to investigate the zero-difference feasibility for this new instrument, which after its launch in September 2013 started to use BDS signals from five geostationary orbit (GEO) satellites, five inclined geosynchronous orbit (IGSO) satellites and four medium Earth orbit (MEO) satellites. We used a 3-month set of GNOS BDS RO data (October to December 2013) for the evaluation and compared atmospheric bending angle and refractivity profiles, derived from single- and zero-difference excess phase data, against co-located profiles from European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts (ECMWF) analyses. We also compared against co-located refractivity profiles from radiosondes. The statistical evaluation against these reference data shows that the results from single- and zero-difference processing are reasonably consistent in both bias and standard deviation, clearly demonstrating the feasibility of zero differencing for GNOS BDS RO observations. The average bias (and standard deviation) of the bending angle and refractivity profiles were found to be about 0.05 to 0.2 % (and 0.7 to 1.6 %) over the upper troposphere and lower stratosphere. Zero differencing was found to perform slightly better, as may be expected from its lower vulnerability to noise. The validation results indicate that GNOS can provide, on top of GPS RO profiles, accurate and precise BDS RO profiles both from single- and zero-difference processing. The GNOS observations by the series of FY-3 satellites are thus expected to provide important contributions to numerical weather prediction and global climate change analysis.

Global Statistical Assessment and Cross-Calibration with Jason-2 for Reprocessed HY-2 A Altimeter Data

ABSTRACTHY-2 A (Haiyang-2 A) satellite was launched on August 16, 2011 and radar altimeter is one of its main payloads. We reprocessed two years of HY-2 A altimeter sensor geophysical dataset records (SGDR) data. This paper presents the main results in terms of reprocessed HY-2 A altimeter data quality: verification of data availability and validity, monitoring several relevant altimeter parameters, and assessment of the HY-2 A altimeter system performances. A cross-calibration analysis of reprocessed HY-2 A altimeter data with Jason-2 was conducted. The reprocessed HY-2 A altimeter data show good quality and have a low level of noise with respect to Jason-2. The same geophysical correction methods were used to calculate the sea surface height (SSH) for the two missions. The mean standard deviations of the crossover differences for HY-2 A and Jason-2 are 5.24 cm and 5.34 cm, respectively. The mean standard deviation of the crossover differences between HY-2 A and Jason-2 is 5.37 cm. These show that HY-2 A can provide SSH measurements at almost the same level of accuracy as Jason-2. The relative SSH bias between HY-2 A and Jason-2 due to the Ultra Stable Oscillator (USO) drift is obviously observed, and it can affect the calculation of mean sea level and should be further studied and corrected.

Initial performance of the radio occultation experiment in the Venus orbiter mission Akatsuki

After the arrival of Akatsuki spacecraft of Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency at Venus in December 2015, the radio occultation experiment, termed RS (Radio Science), obtained 19 vertical profiles of the Venusian atmosphere by April 2017. An onboard ultra-stable oscillator is used to generate stable X-band downlink signals needed for the experiment. The quantities to be retrieved are the atmospheric pressure, the temperature, the sulfuric acid vapor mixing ratio, and the electron density. Temperature profiles were successfully obtained down to ~ 38 km altitude and show distinct atmospheric structures depending on the altitude. The overall structure is close to the previous observations, suggesting a remarkable stability of the thermal structure. Local time-dependent features are seen within and above the clouds, which is located around 48–70 km altitude. The H2SO4 vapor density roughly follows the saturation curve at cloud heights, suggesting equilibrium with cloud particles. The ionospheric electron density profiles are also successfully retrieved, showing distinct local time dependence. Akatsuki RS mainly probes the low and middle latitude regions thanks to the near-equatorial orbit in contrast to the previous radio occultation experiments using polar orbiters. Studies based on combined analyses of RS and optical imaging data are ongoing.Graphical abstract.

Radio occultation measurements of Pluto’s neutral atmosphere with New Horizons

On 14 July 2015 New Horizons performed a radio occultation (RO) that sounded Pluto’s atmosphere down to the surface. The sensitivity of the measurements was enhanced by a unique configuration of ground equipment and spacecraft instrumentation. Signals were transmitted simultaneously by four antennas of the NASA Deep Space Network, each radiating 20 kW at a wavelength of 4.2 cm. The polarization was right circular for one pair of signals and left circular for the other pair. New Horizons received the four signals and separated them by polarization for processing by two independent receivers, each referenced to a different ultra-stable oscillator. The two data streams were digitized, filtered, and stored on the spacecraft for later transmission to Earth. The results reported here are the first to utilize the complete set of observations. We calibrated each signal to remove effects not associated with Pluto’s atmosphere, including the limb diffraction pattern. We then applied a specialized method of analysis to retrieve profiles of number density, pressure, and temperature from the combined phase measurements. Occultation entry sounded the atmosphere at sunset at 193.5°E, 17.0°S — on the southeast margin of an ice-filled basin known informally as Sputnik Planitia (SP); occultation exit occurred at sunrise at 15.7°E, 15.1°N — near the center of the Charon-facing hemisphere. Above 1215 km radius (∼25 km altitude) there is no discernible difference between the measurements at entry and exit, and the RO profiles are consistent with results derived from ground-based stellar occultation measurements. At lower altitudes the RO measurements reveal horizontal variations in atmospheric structure that had not been observed previously, and they are the first to reach the ground. The entry profile has a strong temperature inversion that ends 3.5 km above the surface, and the temperature in the cold boundary layer beneath the inversion is nearly constant, 38.9 ± 2.1 K, and close to the saturation temperature of N2. The exit profile has a much weaker inversion that extends all the way to the ground, where the air temperature is 51.6 ± 3.8 K. Three factors appear to be responsible for the presence of a cold boundary layer in the entry profile (Forget et al., 2017): a substantial diurnal cycle of sublimation and condensation of N2 ice in SP, the local time of the RO observation, and confinement within SP by the surrounding topography and katabatic winds. We have also determined the surface pressure and the local radius at both entry and exit. The best pressure reference is the mean value: 11.5 ± 0.7 microbar at 1189.9 ± 0.2 km.

Drifts and Environmental Disturbances in Atomic Clock Subsystems: Quantifying Local Oscillator, Control Loop, and Ion Resonance Interactions.

Linear ion trap frequency standards are among the most stable continuously operating frequency references and clocks. Depending on the application, they have been operated with a variety of local oscillators (LOs), including quartz ultrastable oscillators, hydrogen-masers, and cryogenic sapphire oscillators. The short-, intermediate-, and long-term stability of the frequency output is a complicated function of the fundamental performances, the time dependence of environmental disturbances, the atomic interrogation algorithm, the implemented control loop, and the environmental sensitivity of the LO and the atomic system components. For applications that require moving these references out of controlled lab spaces and into less stable environments, such as fieldwork or spaceflight, a deeper understanding is needed of how disturbances at different timescales impact the various subsystems of the clock and ultimately the output stability. In this paper, we analyze which perturbations have an impact and to what degree. We also report on a computational model of a control loop, which keeps the microwave source locked to the ion resonance. This model is shown to agree with laboratory measurements of how well the feedback removes various disturbances and also with a useful analytic approach we developed for predicting these impacts.

A low power cryocooled autonomous ultra-stable oscillator

We present the design and the preliminary evaluation of a cryostat equipped with a low power pulse-tube cryocooler intended to maintain near 5K a high-Q factor sapphire microwave resonator. This cooled resonator constitutes the frequency reference of an ultra-stable oscillator presenting a short term fractional frequency stability of better than 1×10-15 . The proposed design enables to reach a state-of-the-art frequency stability with a cryogenic oscillator consuming only 3kW of electrical power.

Ultra-stable high-power mid-infrared optical parametric oscillator pumped by a super-fluorescent fiber source.

The longterm stability of the laser system is very important in many applications. In this letter, an ultra-stable, broadband, mid-infrared (MIR) optical parametric oscillator (OPO) pumped by a super-fluorescent fiber source is demonstrated. An idler MIR output power of 11.3 W with excellent beam quality was obtained and the corresponding pump-to-idler conversion slope efficiency was 15.9%. Furthermore, during 1h measurement at full power operation, the peak-to-peak fluctuation of idler output power was less than 1.9% and the corresponding standard deviation was less than 0.4% RMS, which was much better than that of a traditional single mode fiber laser pumped OPO system (10.9% for peak-to-peak fluctuation and 1.8% RMS for the standard deviation) in another experiment for comparison. To our knowledge, this is the first demonstration on a high-power, ultra-stable OPO system by using the modefree pump source, which offered an effective approach to achieve an ultra-stable MIR source and broadened the range of the super-fluorescent fiber source applications.

Development of the Reconstructive Transponder for In-Orbit Calibration of HY-2A Altimeter

China’s first ocean dynamic satellite HY-2A was launched in August 2011 which carries a dual-frequency (Ku- and C-band) altimeter to measure the global mean sea level. In-orbit calibration is essential for reliably measuring sea-surface height (SSH). This paper concerns a novel approach for HY-2A altimeter in-orbit calibration using a reconstructive transponder, which is different from the existing bent-pipe transponder. The reconstructive transponder captures, tracks, and records the altimeter’s pulses, then reconstructs the pulses, and transmits them back to the altimeter. It is carried on a SUV, reduces requirement for a permanent installation site, and is much more flexible and efficient. There is an internal calibration loop to enable the stability of the transponder electronics delay and the system gain. The transponder electronics delay and system gain are obtained through an overall measurement. Another benefit of the signal reconstructive transponder is to accurately estimate the altimeter clock frequency drift. HY-2A altimeter in-orbit calibration campaign started from March 2012, until now more than 70 experiments have been carried out at several sites. On March 31, 2013, HY-2A altimeter side-A failed owing to malfunction of its ultrastable oscillator (USO). And this abnormality is monitored by the transponder. From the successful experiments, HY-2A altimeter side-A and side-B instrument bias are obtained with 1- and 4-cm precisions separately. The USO frequency drifts of the HY-2A altimeter are monitored all through the calibration campaign.