A simple microcontroller based digital lock-in amplifier for the detection of low level optical signals

Abstract

Traditionally digital lock-in amplifiers sample the input signal at a rate much higher than the lock-in reference frequency and perform the lock-in algorithm with high-speed processors. We present a small and simple digital lock-in amplifier that uses a 20 bit current integrating analogue-to-digital converter interfaced to a microcontroller. The sample rate is set to twice the reference frequency placing the sampled lock-in signal at the Nyquist frequency allowing the lock-in procedure to be performed with one simple algorithm. This algorithm consists of a spectral inversion technique integrated into a highly optimised low-pass filter. We demonstrate a system with a dynamic range of 103 dB recovering signals up to 85 dB below the interference.