We report an orientation-sensitive omnidirectional vibration sensor based on fiber Bragg gratings (FBGs) inscribed in a seven-core optical fiber. By monitoring the central wavelength shifts of three FBGs in the central core and two outer cores, orientation information in 0-180° range as well as the acceleration value are obtained. The performance of the vibration sensor is characterized at different frequencies, orientations and accelerations. Comparison results for orientation discrimination using different groups of outer cores are investigated to enhance the reliability of the vibration sensor. The experimental results demonstrate an accuracy as high as 0.01° for orientation discrimination. The compact size and simple structure make the vibration sensor potentially superior in industrial applications where precise monitoring of the orientation is a necessity.
FBG fabrication and thermal characterization of a silica/silicone hybrid microstructured optical fiber is demonstrated. The thin film of PDMS created on the inner surface of the microstructured optical fiber acts as the cladding. The measured temperature sensitivity is -110.9 pm/°C. Bragg wavelength of the FBG is tuned through UV irradiation and the thermal effect is further explored.
In this paper, we present a miniature fluidic flowmeter based on a packaged FBG and laser-heated fibers. The flow rates of water and hydraulic oil were measured by utilizing the proposed flowmeter. The measured results exhibited good sensitivity of 0.339 nm/(m/s) for water and 0.578 nm/(m/s) for oil flow. Experimental results showed that the sensitivity of the fluidic flow sensor is depending on the heat capacity of the fluids, where the fluid with higher heat capacity has higher sensitivity and lower detection limit at the same measurement condition. The real-time flow rates measured by the proposed sensor and a commercial flowmeter installed in the test rig were also compared, demonstrating good agreement with correlation coefficient of 0.9974.
We present a novel optical fiber consisting of a suspended-fiber with core and cladding diameter of ~ 5 and 30 μm and a supporting ring with thickness of ~ 9 μm. The outer diameter of the fiber was 125 μm and a fiber Bragg grating (FBG) with a length of 1-mm was inscribed on it. Hydrostatic pressure was measured by monitoring the Bragg wavelength shifts of 9-mm long single-ring suspended fiber. Pressure sensitivity was measured to be –18.92 pm/MPa, which is about five times higher than FBG on standard single-mode fiber.
Thermal management is critical for kw-level power lasers, where mode instability driven by quantum defect heating is a major challenge. Tandem pumping using 1018nm fiber lasers are used to enable both high brightness and low quantum defect. It is, however, difficult to realize efficient 1018nm YDFL. The best demonstration to date is limited by the use of both conventional aluminosilicate host and smaller core diameters. In these cases, higher inversion is required due to the aluminosilicate host and higher pump brightness is required due to the smaller core, which results in high signal brightness for the same output power. These factors lead to large pump power to exit fiber, resulting in poor efficiency. Phosphosilicate host, on the other hand, requires much lower inversions to reach the gain threshold at 1018nm. The combination of phosphosilicate host and large-core leakage channel fibers (LCF) is a perfect candidate for efficient 1018nm fiber laser. We report a highly efficient Yb-doped phosphosilicate LCF laser with a quantum defect of 4.1% using a ~50μm-core diameter and ~420μm cladding diameter. The slope efficiency with respect to the launched pump power at 1018nm is 70%. The ASE suppression is <60dB. The large cladding of 420μm demonstrates a combination of high efficiency, ~4% quantum defect and high-power low-brightness diode pumping. We have also studied the limits of operating ytterbium fiber lasers at shorter wavelengths and found the efficiency to fall off at shorter wavelengths due to the much higher inversions required.
An all-fiber optical anemometer with high light-heat conversion efficiency by using an in-house microstructured optical fiber Bragg grating (MOFBG) is presented. Low-molten-temperature BiSnIn alloy was successfully infiltrated into 11- cm length of a six-hole microstructured optical fiber which was inscribed with a fibre Bragg grating (FBG) centered at ~848 nm. Light launched into the MOFBG was strongly absorbed by the metal to generate heat, while the FBG was utilized to monitor temperature change due to surrounding wind speed. The sensitivity of the laser-heated MOFBG anemometer was measured to be ~0.1 nm/(m/s) for wind speed ranged from 0.5 m/s to 2 m/s. The efficiency of the anemometer, defined as effective sensitivity per pump power, is 8.7 nm/(m/s*W).
We report the fabrication and characterization of an in-line photonic crystal fiber optofluidic refractometer assisted by a C-shaped fiber. The C-shaped fiber spliced between the PCF and the SMF enables simultaneous in-line optical signal delivery and analyte fluid feeding. Using an arc discharge technique, we achieve selective exploitation of only the central two voids of the PCF for microfluidic sensing. Based on a Sagnac interferometer, a highly sensitive refractometer with sensitivity of 8699 nm/RIU and detection limit of 10–6 for RI around 1.333 was achieved experimentally, which agrees well with the theoretical value of 8675 nm/RIU.
We demonstrated an in-line open cavity Fabry–Pérot interferometer (FPI) for liquid refractive index sensing with linear response and high sensitivity. The FPI was fabricated by splicing a short piece of C-shaped fiber (tens of micrometers) between two standard single-mode fibers. The refractive index response of the FPI was characterized by ethanol-water mixtures in the range of 1.33 to 1.36, and a high sensitivity of 1294 nm/RIU at the wavelength of 1550 nm was achieved. The sensor was used to measure the thermo-optic coefficient of pure water, and the results agree well with the literature.
Microfluidic device with integrated flow rate sensor is demonstrated. Two glass capillaries and a short length of high light-absorption, Co2+-doped fiber were stacked inside another capillary and drawn into a taper, containing two ~40μm diameter microchannels. An FBG was inscribed in the Co2+-doped fiber. 1480 nm light was used to heat the Co2+-doped fiber and its temperature was measured using an FBG-interrogator operating around 1550nm. The flow rate of the liquid inside in the microchannel can be determined by the temperature and cooling rate of the microchannel. Sensitivity of 0.304nm/(μL/s) and minimum detectable flow rate ~16nL/s were demonstrated.
A hydrostatic pressure sensor based on a custom made two-core photonic crystal fiber (TC-PCF) is experimentally
demonstrated. The TC-PCF was fabricated in our lab using standard PCF fabrication techniques. A hydrostatic pressure
sensor based on the in-line fiber Mach-Zehnder interference is reported. The two solid cores of the TC-PCF separated by
an air hole acted as the two arms in the interferometer. The pressure sensor has high repeatability and high sensitivity of
-54.06 pm/MPa.
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