Time-transfer applications of a commercially available optical clock: bistatic and multistatic radar enhancement

Tiqker Prime™ offers hydrogen-maser-class timing performance in a field-deployable, low c-SWAP (cost, size, weight, and power) format. This two-photon Rb clock achieves a relative frequency stability of ≤1×10⁻¹³ at 1 second and ≤6×10⁻¹⁵ at 10⁴ seconds, with low phase noise outputs and fast warmup. Tiqker enables value-added performance in applications beyond timing resilience (e.g., GNSS backup). Trials show that Tiqker combined with a White Rabbit time transfer network can achieve 100 ps synchronization accuracy and 2 ps jitter over a 15 km fiber link. As an application example, we model the impact of Tiqker's timing stability on bistatic and multistatic radar performance and compare this to representative timing standards, including a GNSS disciplined oscillator, a cesium beam clock, and microwave Rb clocks. At short ranges (≤2 km), Tiqker shows modest performance improvements relative to the other standards, while at longer ranges (8–10 km) the modeled impact of timing stability becomes more pronounced. Key multistatic radar performance parameters, including range accuracy, velocity accuracy, coherent integration gain, and detection probability, are modeled to exhibit significantly improved long-range behavior under Tiqker's high-stability timing conditions.