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Session D3: Application/Impact of PNT Technologies in the Homeland Critical Infrastructure

A Leap to Sub-Nano Second Clock Synchronization
Alaiya Tuntemeke-Winter, Brent Abbott, Orolia Defense & Security
Location: Ballroom D
Date/Time: Tuesday, Jun. 13, 9:35 a.m.

In recent years there has been a rise in the widespread use of GNSS in critical national infrastructure. In light of current events, the concern presented by a GNSS outage causes us to take a closer look at the safeguards in place to mitigate these threats. Creating a system to back-up and work alongside existing GNSS systems is an important step in decreasing the vulnerabilities presented by purely GNSS systems. Using new technologies can not only improve future infrastructure but can integrate with existing systems to leap towards improvements in resiliency.
PNT technologies are now used in various types of infrastructure from finance to transportation. At the core of many of these sectors are synchronized timing systems. Synchronizing a time system involves both the generation and distribution of time. During generation the system will obtain the time from a GNSS source and an atomic clock and align the system time. Distribution of time to other distributed systems is done through various methods such as NTP, PTP, and PPS. GNSS is the single point of failure in these systems, but by introducing a back-up to GNSS you can improve these systems and introduce safeguards to the system. Not all back-ups are equal - important key requirements of this backup are low latency, high data quality, and ease of integration. Introducing a technology that can address these three key requirements is critical to maintaining a resilient infrastructure.
White Rabbit (WR) Precision Network Time Sync is designed to improve, augment, or replace existing timing infrastructure. The branded term “White Rabbit” is a technology that grew out of the particle accelerator research community at the CERN Super Collider and is commercially available today. Sub-nanosecond time and phase synchronization is now achievable over ethernet network connections carrying other data. In ideal situations, relative sync alignment down to ~10 picoseconds are possible. White Rabbit is already showing the ability to improve infrastructure connecting US trading locations and working with the US transportation department.
White Rabbit (WR), coupled with a resilient time server such as a SecureSync, allows for time synchronization resilience with automatic failover between GNSS sources at diverse geographic sites. White Rabbit has been proven to be able to distribute time at a sub-nanosecond rate and with low phase noise frequency. This distribution of time and frequency across the network delivers the same clock reference to all sites ensuring accuracy and precision. The need for resilient time synchronization is required for daily operations over long distances and this can be provided using white rabbit. Rather than replacing the existing system white rabbit improves PTP capabilities and can utilize a single network connection to simplify existing networks.
Coupled with multi-layered oscillator systems, White Rabbit implementations provide highly accurate, scalable, and resilient time and frequency information.

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