Implementing RF broadband chaotic oscillators: design issues and results

The recent discovery of chaotic synchronization has spawned a flurry of activity in applying chaos to communications. These efforts have sought to explore the potential capabilities/benefits of the three basic elements in a chaos-based communications system: the chaotic carrier, the synchronization process, and the carrier modulation. The heart of these systems is the chaos generator that must be configured to produce the generalized carrier. Several generator implementations have been developed, including low-frequency analog and digital circuits, and high frequency analog phase-locked loops and negative-resistance based oscillators. This paper surveys efforts to push chaos generation from baseband to a wideband high-frequency regime, forming the basis for a broadband microwave chaos-based communications system. Several key circuit implementation issues involving this frequency migration are identified and discussed. Accomplishment highlights are presented, including the invention of a novel wideband high-frequency chaotic oscillator design approach.