IEEE JOURNAL OF OCEANIC ENGINEERING, VOL. 39, NO.
2, APRIL 2014
Smart IEEE–1588 GPS Clock Emulator
for Cabled Ocean Sensors
Joaquín Del Río, Daniel Mihai Toma, Shahram Shariat-Panahi, Yves Auffret, and Antoni Mànuel-Làzaro
Abstract—Today, cabled seafloor observatories are installed at
many sites around the globe, gathering different types of sensors in
the marine environment where a Global Positioning System (GPS)
signal is not accessible. Accurate time marking of ocean sensor
data is highly important in many marine applications. This paper
presents a smart GPS emulator based on the IEEE–1588 Precision
Time Protocol (PTP). The device was designed and implemented to
be able to provide accurate timing data (trigger + time code) to any
ocean sensor as a broadband seismometer. In this case, accurate lo-
cation and magnitude of a detected earthquake are dependent on
the accuracy of the data time marks. The performance of time syn-
chronization is tested, using a commercial broadband seismometer,
and the results are presented. These tests are based on a compar-
ison of the synchronization trigger between master and slave clocks
as well as the analysis of the data acquired by the seismometer.
The work presented here leads to an improved performance of the
ocean-bottom seismometers as well as tsunami warning systems.
Index Terms—Global Positioning System (GPS) clock emulator,
IEEE–1588, seafloor observatory, seismometer, smart sensor, time
synchronization.
I. INTRODUCTION
T HE continuous climate change has brought up the need for
measurement of ocean environmental parameters around
the world. This has taken many research institutes to deploy
cabled seafloor observatories during the last decade. Among
these, we point out the Monterey Accelerated Research System
(MARS) in the United States [1], NEPTUNE [2] and VENUS
[3] networks in Canada, the ESONET Network of Excellence
(NoE) Initiative in Europe [4], and the Expandible Seafloor Ob-
servatory (OBSEA) in Spain [5]. Many ocean sensors are gath-
ered in a cabled seafloor observatory, taking long-term environ-
mental measurements and providing real-time data to scientists
through the Ethernet. In many applications, accurate time marks
Manuscript received June 16, 2011; revised September 26, 2012 and March
04, 2013; accepted May 23, 2013. Date of publication September 20, 2013; date
of current version April 10, 2014. This work was carried out within the Sistemas
Inalambricos Para la Extension de Observatorios Submarinos (SINEOS) Project
under Grant CTM2010-15459 and the Interoperabilidad en Redes de Sensores
Marinos y Ambientales (INTIMAS) Project under Grant CTM2009-08867 sup-
ported by the Spanish Science and Innovation Ministry (MINECO).
Associate Editor: J. F. Lynch.
J. Del Río, D. M. Toma, and A. Mànuel-Làzaro are with the SARTI Research
Group, Electronics Department, Universitat Politècnica de Catalunya (UPC),
Barcelona 08800, Spain (e-mail: joaquin.del.rio@upc.edu).
S. Shariat-Panahi was with the SARTI Research Group, Electronics Depart-
ment, Universitat Politècnica de Catalunya (UPC), Barcelona 08800, Spain. He
is now with Seismic Instruments, Austin, TX 78731 USA.
Y. Auffret is with the Ecole d’Ingenierus, Institut Supérieur de l’Electronique
et du Numérique (ISEN), Brest 84424, France (e-mail: yves.auffret@isen.fr).
Color versions of one or more of the figures in this paper are available online
at http://ieeexplore.ieee.org.
Digital Object Identifier 10.1109/JOE.2013.2265513
0364-9059 © 2013 IEEE. Personal use is permitted, but republication/redistribution requires IEEE permission.
See http://www.ieee.org/publications_standards/publications/rights/index.html for more information.
269
of the ocean sensor data are a key point to obtain improved
results after data processing in a laboratory. In passive seis-
mology, accurate time marks of the acquired data by an ocean-
bottom seismometer [6], [7] provide the accurate location and
magnitude of a detected earthquake. Very accurate timing data
of ocean-bottom seismometers result in an improved perfor-
mance of the existing tsunami warning systems [8]–[11]. There-
fore, the need for accurate time synchronization of cabled ocean
sensors is required where the Global Positioning System (GPS)
signal is not present.
The IEEE–1588: Precision Clock Synchronization Protocol
for Networked Measurement and Control Systems [12] is a
new standard widely used in industrial applications as robotics,
sensor networks [13], and wireless applications [14]. However,
the application of the IEEE–1588 in the marine environment is
a new approach [15], [16], which needs to be investigated in de-
tail, mainly in marine sensors networks, where network devices
such as switches or routers noncompliant with IEEE–1588
are deployed underwater. The objective of this standard is to
specify a protocol to synchronize independent clocks running
on separate nodes of a distributed measurement and control
system to a high degree of accuracy and precision. The clocks
communicate with each other over a communication network.
In its basic form, this protocol is intended to be administration
free. The protocol generates a master–slave relationship among
the clocks in the system. Within a given subnet of a network,
there will be a single master clock. All clocks ultimately derive
their time from a clock known as the grandmaster clock.
This paper presents a smart platform able to carry out GPS
clock emulation based on the IEEE–1588 standard for ocean
sensors. The designed platform is used to synchronize a broad-
band seismometer. Furthermore, tests have been carried out to
evaluate the performance of the time synchronization in a labo-
ratory environment.
II. IEEE–1588 GPS CLOCK EMULATOR
A. IEEE–1588 Overview
The IEEE–1588 standard specifies a method to synchronize
independent clocks on separate nodes of a packet-distributed
relatively localized network. The nodes communicate with each
other through a bidirectional multicast communication, and
four IEEE–1588 messages are necessary for the synchroniza-
tion process: Sync, Follow_up, Delay_Req, and Delay_Resp.
These messages are depicted in Fig. 1.
In order for a slave node clock to be synchronized with a
master node clock, two quantities must be determined: the slave
node’s clock offset in relation to the master’s clock (offset)
270
Fig. 1. IEEE–1588 time-synchronization message exchange sequence.
[see (2)]; and the network propagation delay (delay) [see (1)].
Considering the fact that the master-to-slave delay is equal to
the slave-to-master delay, using the four messages illustrated in
Fig. 1, offset and delay can be calculated from the four mea-
sured values , , , and
Delay
Offset
B. Protocol Implementation
The IEEE–1588 Precision Time Protocol (PTP) can be im-
plemented in two different approaches: software only or hard-
ware assisted. In software-only implementation, the protocol is
completely executed at the application level and the accuracy
will depend mainly on the software and how the hardware layer
executes the firmware source code. The second approach is the
hardware-assisted implementation that delivers more accurate
time synchronization because the message time stamps are done
at a low level, when the message packet enters or exits the node.
Stellaris microcontrollers from Texas Instruments (Houston,
TX, USA) and Imsys microntrollers from AB (Upplands Väsby,
Sweden) manufactures are two examples of the hardware-as-
sisted support for synchronization using the IEEE–1588 PTP.
Both Imsys IM3200 and Stellaris microcontrollers can execute
the IEEE–1588 protocol versions 1 and 2, stack implementa-
tion from the Zurich University of Applied Sciences (ZHAW,
Zurich, Switzerland) [14]. In addition, an open source stack of
IEEE–1588v1, named PTPd [21], can be executed on Stellaris
microcontrollers. The experimental setup and results presented
in this paper have been received using the PTPd implementa-
tion. Previous results using the Imsys IM3200 have been pub-
lished [15].
The PTPd open source stack has been used to develop an un-
derwater GPS clock emulator installed at the OBSEA cabled
IEEE JOURNAL OF OCEANIC ENGINEERING, VOL. 39, NO. 2, APRIL 2014
Fig. 2. Smart module block diagram.
observatory [5], providing timing synchronization to an under-
water seismometer.
This IEEE–1588 GPS clock emulator is a smart platform
[17] designed to add smart interface [18] capabilities to the ex-
isting ocean sensors. Marine instruments commonly use RS232/
RS422/RS485 as a communication interface to be connected to
an observatory. The new capabilities include converting serial
interface data into a low-power Ethernet interface by adding
several services as: clock synchronization, time stamping, data
logging, embedded instrument driver, etc. This way, all serial in-
struments (90% of the marine sensors) will be accessed through
(1) the Ethernet protocol.
The smart platform is based on the StellarisR Luminary
(2) (Texas Instruments) LM3S9B96 microcontroller which inte-
grates the hardware-assisted support for synchronized networks
utilizing the IEEE–1588 PTP versions 1 and 2. The StellarisR
LM3S9B96 microcontroller is based on the ARM Cortex-M3
controller core operating at up to 80 MHz, with 256-kB flash
and 96-kB SRAM and ROM. More specific features of the
designed module include:
— the IEEE–1451 Standard for a Smart Transducer Interface
for Sensors and Actuators [19];
— a serial port (RS232, RS422, RS485) selectable by soft-
ware, for the scientific instrument;
— CAN, I2C, SPI, USB 2.0 on-the-go (OTG) interfaces;
— the pulse-per-second (PPS) output, the National Marine
Electronic Association (NMEA) serial interface output for
the time code, the Trimble Standard Interface Protocol
(TSIP), and the Inter-Range Instrumentation Group Time
Codes (IRIG–B);
— the IEEE–1588 precision clock synchronization protocol
for the networked measurement and control systems (PTP
versions 1 and 2);
— the underwater GPS clock emulation (PPS + time code);
— oscillators: regular quartz-based oscillator or high-sta-
bility temperature compensated crystal oscillator (TCXO):
3.10 to 3.10 .
Fig. 2 shows a block diagram of the designed smart module.
In this paper, we have focused on the IEEE–1588 time syn-
chronization capabilities of the designed module. In this case,
we have used the PTPd [21] IEEE–1588 version 1. Fig. 3 shows
DEL RÍO et al.: SMART IEEE–1588 GPS CLOCK EMULATOR FOR CABLED OCEAN SENSORS
Fig. 3. Smart module in charge of the IEEE–1588 GPS clock emulation.
Fig. 4. PPS signals drift evolution with the IEEE–1588 PTP.
a picture of the designed smart module, used as the IEEE–1588
GPS clock emulator.
To show the necessity of a time syncronization protocol, the
drift between the master clock (onshore) and the slave clock
(underwater) was measured before deployment, comparing PPS
signals generated by the nodes. Fig. 4 shows how the drift in-
creases as a function of time when the synchronization pro-
tocol is not implemented. Each platform generated a 1-Hz clock
signal and, due to drifts in their main clocks, the signals drifted
from one another. As depicted, the clock drifts 0.5 s each 14 400
s (1 s each 28 800 s), 34.7 uS/S. This big drift is because a regular
quartz-based oscillator was used at the slave clock to study the
worst case scenario. Better results will be achieved if a TCXO
is used.
III. SEISMOMETER TIME SYNCHRONIZATION
The used seismic system is a Trillium 120 PA together with a
Taurus acquisition system from Nanometrics Inc. (Kanata, ON,
Canada). Weighing only 7.2 kg and measuring only 21 cm in
diameter, Trillium 120 P/PA seismometers are the three-com-
ponent, very broadband, low-noise seismometers suitable for
both portable and fixed applications. With an extended low-fre-
quency range useful to beyond 1000 s, the ability to resolve Pe-
terson’s new low-noise model (NLNM) [20] down to a 100-s
period, low noise, and wide dynamic range, these observatory-
class seismometers are ideal for teleseismic, regional, and local
studies.
The Taurus portable seismograph is a compact, self-contained
digitizer and data logger that combines exceptional performance
with versatility and low-power consumption. The Taurus can
be used either as a standalone time-series data logger or as a
component in a data acquisition network. Taurus incorporates
a three-channel 24-b digitizer, GPS receiver and system clock,
271
removable data storage, and remote communication options. In
the Taurus normal operation, the GPS antenna is connected to
the Taurus digitizer where an internal GPS receiver takes care
of the time synchronization. However, for our application, the
Taurus internal GPS receiver is removed and internal connec-
tions of the data logger are modified to receive the time synchro-
nization data externally. Taurus is configurable locally using the
color display screen and integrated browser or remotely using
any web browser over a Transmission Control Protocol/Internet
Protocol (TCP/IP) connection.
The smart module microcontroller internally implements
the IEEE–1588 standard by hardware and is in charge of
sending time synchronization packets as well as the PPS signal
(trigger) to the Taurus. On the other hand, the smart module
carries out time synchronization with a grandmaster clock, in
this case, a PXI-6682 card from National Instruments. The
luminary board and the grandmaster clock are connected to
the local area network (LAN) of the observatory. GPS data
formats, including timing, position, and satellite information,
are encoded following standards such as NMEA0183 or the
Trimble Standard Interface Protocol (TSIP). In this case, the
format required by the Taurus digitizer was TSIP. Custom
implementation of the TSIP was developed in order for the
GPS clock emulator to be able to sent data frames using the
TSIP format to the Taurus digitizer via the serial port. Fig. 5
shows a block diagram of the implemented IEEE–1588 time
synchronization system. As can be seen, at the shore station,
the master clock with GPS capabilities is connected to the
LAN’s observatory. On the other end, offshore, the developed
GPS clock emulator synchronizes its clock with the master
clock using PTP. The GPS clock emulator provides the same
information to the seismometer that a “real outdoor GPS” will
provide if the system is onshore: TSIP data frames for timing
information and the PPS signal for synchronization.
IV. TIME SYNCHRONIZATION TESTS AND RESULTS
To find the time synchronization performance of the imple-
mented system, two tests have been carried out: first to find the
trigger (PPS) offset provided by the IEEE–1588 GPS clock em-
ulator in comparison with the PPS signal provided by the GPS
master clock, and a second test to find the time delay introduced
by the data logger data acquisition firmware in the data time
stamp process.
A. Trigger Offset Test (Slave Offset From the Master)
In this test, the same configuration and instruments as in a
real seafloor observatory (OBSEA) are used. The grandmaster
clock and the IEEE–1588 GPS clock emulator are connected to
the 100-MB LAN network with three switches. These are ordi-
nary switches that do not implement the IEEE–1588 standard
in their hardware. This is an important issue. PTP defines trans-
parent clock (TC) and boundary clock (BC) capabilities of net-
work devices like switches in order to improve the calculations
of delay and offset parameters described in (1) and (2). In the
case that network devices are deployed underwater and they do
not work as a BC or a TC, it is necessary to test the performance
of the system. For that reason, the NetStress Network Bench-
marking [22] tool was used to generate the 100-Mb/s traffic in
272 IEEE JOURNAL OF OCEANIC ENGINEERING, VOL. 39, NO. 2, APRIL 2014

Fig. 5. Seismometer IEEE–1588 time synchronization block diagram.

Fig. 7. PTP experiment results. Note that the horizontal scale is 200 ns per
division.
Fig. 6. System setup in a laboratory environment.

master and slave clocks. This means that, every second, the
both switches. Fig. 6 shows a block diagram of the system setup
slave clock adjusts its clock if sync messages are correctly re-
in a laboratory environment.
ceived. Due to the network payload, once in a while, some sync
The time difference evolution between the two PPS signals
messages (UDP messages) do not arrive at their destinations,
(the GPS master clock and the GPS clock emulator), aligned
and the slave clock drift due to the oscillator stability is not ad-
with the second transition of the two clocks that have been syn-
justed before PPS generation, resulting in a bit trigger offset be-
chronized using IEEE–1588, was measured with the digital os-
tween the slave and master PPS signals. During 70 h of the test,
cilloscope, as presented in Fig. 7.
251 827 multicast UDP sync messages were sent with the net-
The first results, due to the use of non-PTP-compliant Eth-
work stressed at 100% and 385 packets were lost, which repre-
ernet switches, illustrated bad performance with an important
sents a 0.15% of the total sync packets. Due to the big drift of
accuracy error due to the network traffic. To improve the perfor-
the slave quartz-based oscillator, this causes the spurious peaks
mance, two virtual LANs (VLANs) were configured in the Eth-
that appear in Fig. 8.
ernet switches to reduce the variability of the PTP frame time.
Fig. 9 shows the histogram of the slave clock offset from
One VLAN conducted only PTP frames between the master and
the master clock measurements during the test duration: posi-
slave clocks. The second VLAN conducted the rest of the net-
tive and negative delays can appear due to a synchronization
work traffic: seimometer data, network payload, etc.
process. Because of that, accuracy is calculated as the mean
The duration of the experiment was 70 h, and the results are
value of the absolute measurements, as can be shown in
given in Fig. 8.
Fig. 8 shows that the trigger offset (the slave clock delay from
the master clock) between the master and slave clocks remains (3)
constant with time. The peaks in Fig. 8 correspond to the slave
not being able to synchronize with the master due to the network From this test, an accuracy of 28 ns with a standard deviation
traffic. Sync messages are generated every second between the of 98 ns is achieved with 252 000 measurements (70 h).
DEL RÍO et al.: SMART IEEE–1588 GPS CLOCK EMULATOR FOR CABLED OCEAN SENSORS 273

Fig. 8. Evolution of the slave offset from the master.

Fig. 9. Histogram of the slave offset between the master and slave clocks. Fig. 10. Ramp signal generated by a signal generator triggered by the synchro-
nized PPS signal.

B. Data Acquisition Timing Test

To compare the time marks of the data acquired by the Taurus
data logger to the IEEE–1588 GPS clock emulator timing, a
test is proposed. In this test, the synchronized PPS signal of the
IEEE–1588 GPS clock emulator is used to trigger a burst from
a signal generator. The generated ramp-shaped signal is used
as the Taurus data logger input signal. The ramp signal trig-
gered by the PPS crosses 0 V at every rising edge. This behavior
can be seen in Fig. 10. A data acquisition is carried out with a
500-Hz sampling rate (sampling interval 2 ms), and the stored
data time marks are studied to obtain the time mark delay. The
square signal corresponds to the PPS trigger signal, and the ramp
signal corresponds to the signal generated by the generator. By
decreasing the slope of the input signal at instants where the
trigger signal (PPS) is generated, we can measure the time dif-
ference between zero crossings with a better accuracy. The gen-
erated signal is acquired by the data logger and is represented in
Fig. 11. Linear signal acquired by the Taurus digitizer.
Fig. 11.
Fig. 11 shows that the start time of the first pulse is on
April 8, 2011, at 10:34:29.000061Z. If this time is com- data time stamped from different instruments are compared or
pared to the grandmaster clock time (April 8, 2011, at processed to generate indirect measurements.
10:34:29.000000000Z), when the first PPS was generated,
a delay of 61 s is observed. We can conclude with this test that V. CONCLUSION
this time difference corresponds to a seismomenter software A smart module was designed and built providing a series
delay in the process of data time stamping during the data of services as GPS clock emulation to the ocean sensors. The
acquisition This difference is important to be known when IEEE–1588 GPS clock emulator provides accurate timing data
274
Fig. 12. Example of data provided by the underwater broadband seismometer synchronized by the GPS emulator.
as well as the synchronized trigger to underwater sensor nodes.
This implementation is highly useful in applications where
the GPS signal is not accessible. A time synchronization of a
broadband seismometer is carried out using the IEEE–1588
GPS clock emulator. The carried out tests show a mean ac-
curacy offset between the grandmaster and slave clocks of
about 28 with a standard deviation of 98 ns. This means that
the IEEE–1588 GPS clock emulator can synchronize sensors
with a timing accuracy below 1 s. Further tests have shown a
software delay of about 61 s in the data logger data acquisition
and time marking. Accurate time synchronization of broadband
seismometers leads to an improved performance of tsunami
warning systems. Furthermore, the IEEE–1588 time-synchro-
nized broadband seismometer was deployed at the OBSEA
observatory in the first half of 2012. Currently, the underwater
broadband seismometer is working properly and is providing
data, as is depicted in Fig. 12. The seismometer was integrated
within the regional network of seismometers managed by the
Institut Geològic de Catalunya (IGC, Barcelona, Spain).
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Joaquín Del Río was born in Catalonia, Spain, in
1976. He received the B.S., M.S., and Ph.D. degrees
in telecommunication engineering and electronic
engineering from the Universitat Politècnica de
Catalunya (UPC), Barcelona, Spain, in 1999, 2002,
and 2011, respectively.
Since 2001, he has been a Professor at the
Electronic Engineering Department, UPC. He is a
member of the research group “Remote Acquisi-
tion Systems and Data Processing (SARTI).” His
research is focused on electronic instrumentation,
interoperability in marine sensor networks, and wireless sensor networks. He
is a member of the NIST IEEE1451.2 Working Group and the Smart Ocean
Sensors Consortium and PUCK Standard Working Group (SWG). He is
involved in projects within the industry and funded public research projects and
is a National Instruments Certified Instructor for teaching official LabVIEW
courses.
DEL RÍO et al.: SMART IEEE–1588 GPS CLOCK EMULATOR FOR CABLED OCEAN SENSORS
Daniel Mihai Toma received the M.Sc. degree in
electrical engineering from the Technical University
“Gheorghe Asachi,” Iasi, Romania, in 2008 and the
Ph.D. degree in electronic engineering from the Uni-
versitat Politècnica de Catalunya (UPC), Barcelona,
Spain, in 2012.
He is currently a member of the research group
“Remote Acquisition Systems and Data Processing
(SARTI),” UPC. His current research interests
include electronic instrumentation, wireless ad hoc
networks, interoperability in sensor networks, and
synchronization and scheduling.
Shahram Shariat-Panahi was born in Tehran, Iran,
in 1972. He received the B.S. degree in telecommuni-
cations engineering, with specialization in electronic
equipment, from the School of Engineering of Vi-
lanova i la Geltrú (EPSEVG), Universitat Politècnica
de Catalunya (UPC), Vilanova I la Geltrú, Spain, in
1998 and the M.S. and Ph.D. degrees in electronic en-
gineering from UPC, Barcelona, Spain, in 2002 and
2007, respectively.
He was an Associate Professor with the Depart-
ment of Electronic Engineering, UPC. Currently, he
is a Senior Electronic Engineer at Seismic Instruments, Austin, TX, USA. His
research interests include the design and implementation of high-resolution data
acquisition systems for marine instrumentation, characterization of analog-to-
digital converters and waveform recorders, smart sensors, underwater observa-
tories, and underwater acoustics.
275
Yves Auffret was born in France in 1966. He grad-
uated in automated systems and computer sciences
from the University of Western Brittany (Université
de Bretagne Occidentale, UBO), Brest, France, and
received the Ph.D. degree in electronics engineering
from the same university in 2012.
From 1988 to 1993, he worked at Orca Instru-
mentation, Brest, France. In 1993, he joined the
French Research Institute for Exploration of the
Sea (IFREMER), Issy-les-Moulineaux, France. In
2013, he joined the Underwater Acoustic & Instru-
mentation Laboratory, Ecole d’Ingenierus, Institut Supérieur de l’Electronique
et du Numérique (ISEN), Brest, France, as an Associate Professor in Digital
Electronics and Embedded Systems. His current research interests include:
marine and submarine instrumentation, unmanned surface vehicles (USVs),
data acquisition systems, and sea-bottom observatories.
Antoni Mànuel-Làzaro was born in Barcelona,
Spain, in 1954. He received a degree in telecommu-
nication engineering from the Universitat Politècnica
de Catalunya (UPC), Barcelona, Spain, in 1980 and
the Ph.D. degree in telecommunication engineering
from UPC in 1996.
Since 1988, he has been an Associate Professor
in the Department of Electronic Engineering, UPC,
where he is the Director of the research group
“Remote Acquisition Systems and Data Processing
(SARTI),” which comprises 21 researchers. SARTI
is member of the Technological Innovation Centre network within the Catalonia
government (March 2001). He is the coordinator of the Tecnoterra associated
unit of the Scientific Research Council through the Jaume Almera Earth Sci-
ences Institute and the Marine Science Institute. His current research interests
are in applications of automatic measurement systems based on the concept of
virtual instrumentation and oceanic environment. He is the author and coauthor
of numerous papers in international journals, four patents, eight books on
instrumentation and numerous communications in international congresses, in
the area of electronic instrumentation. Currently, he is involved in more than
ten projects with the industry and several funded public research projects.
Prof. Mànuel-Làzaro is a member of the IEEE Oceanic Engineering Society,
the IEEE Signal Processing Society, the IEEE Instrumentation and Measure-
ment Society, the IEEE Education Society, the IEEE Power Electronics So-
ciety, the IEEE Computer Society, the IEEE Communications Society, the Open
Geospatial Consortium (OGC), and the European Seafloor Observatories Net-
work. (ESONET).