Oscillators are a fundamental building block of many communications systems. Demands on spectral purity continue to increase because of constraints on available spectrum, and consequently there has been a need to understand better precisely what causes jitter and phase noise and what to do about it. This book provides a quantitatively description of how circuit and device noise becomes oscillator phase noise and uses this new model to teach the reader how to design low noise oscillators. The emphasizes the integrated oscillators and addresses issues related to design of integrated oscillators. It exploits so-called cyclostationary properties of noise to improve the spectral purity of the oscillator.

This book applies examines in great detail the behavior of both tuned and relaxation oscillators. Long-standing conundrums (such as ''what is the optimum number of stages in a ring oscillator?'') are resolved at last, and an important framework for answering questions as yet unasked is provided.