45 Gbps high-speed real-time physical random bit generator

Abstract

We report a prototype of high-speed real-time physical random bit generator based on a chaotic laser. The chaotic laser consists of a semiconductor laser with optical feedback in fiber external cavity configuration. The chaotic laser intensity signal is quantized into binary stream by differential comparison which makes the amplitude distribution symmetric with respect to zero mean value. An exclusive-OR gate operation between two raw binary streams from the chaotic signal and its delayed signal is used to overcome the influences of the weak periodicity induced by the external cavity resonance inherent in the chaotic laser. After exclusive-OR operation, the prototype can generate a single fast random bit stream in real time without any off-line processing procedures. Its bit rate can be handily and continuously tuned up to 4.5 Gbps by a trigger clock. Experiment results demonstrate that our generator possesses high-quality randomness with verified by the three-standard-deviation criterion and industry-benchmark statistical tests.