High frequency signal source and method of generating same using dielectric resonator oscillator (DRO) circuit

A high frequency signal source comprising:

• a dielectric, free running resonator oscillator having a field effect transistor and an output signal;
• a mixer that receives the output signal from the dielectric resonator oscillator;
• a phase locked loop circuit having a phase locked loop chip and a voltage controlled oscillator with a predetermined tuning range and operatively connected to said mixer such that the mixer receives an output signal from the voltage controlled oscillator and sums the output signals for creating a summed output frequency, wherein a portion of the summed output frequency is fed as a coupled signal into the phase locked loop chip that is phase locked to a reference signal to compensate for dielectric resonator oscillator frequency errors due to manufacturing and for any drift due to temperature changes or aging, wherein a higher output frequency accuracy with low phase noise is achieved without manual tuning and a portion of the tuning range of the voltage controlled oscillator is used to compensate for any dielectric resonator oscillator initial frequency errors and drift over temperature and aging;
• and
• a microcontroller operatively connected to said field effect transistor of the dielectric resonator oscillator and phase locked loop chip for determining a divide ratio between “M” and “N” for the coupled signal and reference signal respectively and adjusting gate bias on the field effect transistor.

A method of generating a high frequency signal comprising the steps of:

• mixing an output signal generated from a dielectric, free running resonator oscillator with an output signal from a voltage controlled oscillator having a predetermined tuning range and part of a phase locked loop circuit to sum the frequencies for creating a summed output frequency;
• filtering the summed output frequency to aid in eliminating unused sidebands;
• and
• coupling a portion of the summed output frequency as a coupled signal into the phase locked loop circuit that is phase locked to a reference signal to compensate for dielectric resonator oscillator frequency errors due to manufacturing and for any drift due to temperature changes or aging, wherein a higher output frequency accuracy with lower phase noise is achieved without manual tuning and a portion of the tuning range of the voltage controlled oscillator compensates for any dielectric resonator oscillator initial frequency errors and drift over temperature and aging.