摘要:
A fiber grating environmental sensing system is described that has the ability to measure strain, vibration, humidity and water content. Fiber gratings are used to measure axial strain to accomplish these goals. An approach is described that uses matched fiber grating sensors and filters to allow for thermal compensation greatly reducing one of the key performance issues facing these systems. The system may be deployed in such applications as roadways and paved surfaces, bridges, buildings and aircraft and spacecraft. Means are described to implement transducers optimized for specific environmental measurements as well as means to demodulate the fiber grating sensors.
摘要:
Fiber grating environmental measurement systems are comprised of sensors that are configured to respond to changes in moisture or chemical content of the surrounding medium through the action of coatings and plates inducing strain that is measured. These sensors can also be used to monitor the interior of bonds for degradation due to aging, cracking, or chemical attack. Means to multiplex these sensors at high speed and with high sensitivity can be accomplished by using spectral filters placed to correspond to each fiber grating environmental sensor. By forming networks of spectral elements and using wavelength division multiplexing arrays of fiber grating sensors may be processed in a single fiber line allowing distributed high sensitivity, high bandwidth fiber optic grating environmental sensor systems to be realized.
摘要:
A medical instrument system includes an elongate instrument body defining a longitudinal axis and capable of being twisted about its longitudinal axis and an optical fiber sensor coupled to the instrument body. A detector is operatively coupled to the optical fiber sensor and configured to detect respective light signals transmitted on the optical fiber sensor. A controller is operatively coupled to the detector and configured to determine a twist of a portion of the instrument body about its longitudinal axis based on an analysis of detected light signals.
摘要:
A medical instrument system includes an elongate flexible instrument body with an optical fiber substantially encapsulated in a wall of the instrument body, the optical fiber including one or more fiber gratings. A detector is operatively coupled to the optical fiber and configured to detect respective light signals reflected by the one or more fiber gratings. A controller is operatively coupled to the detector, and configured to determine a twist of at least a portion of the instrument body based on detected reflected light signals. The instrument may be a guide catheter and may be robotically or manually controlled.
摘要:
A fiber optic grating sensor system is used to localize and measure the environment associated with high speed events including pressure, temperature, velocity and position. This system has the capability to provide timing and physical location markers allowing the character of a rapidly changing event to be accurately measured with specific reference to time and location of that event. The system consists of a fiber grating sensor assembly that may consist of a fiber grating array or chirped fiber grating. Markers are put in place by using short fiber gratings that either occupies a different spatial or spectral space so that environmental measurements can be accurately related to time and space. The reflective spectra can be interpreted rapidly through the use of spectral filters, the disappearance of the fiber grating assembly due to an energetic event or arrays of high speed detectors supported by dispersive elements.
摘要:
Methods for enhancing dynamic range, sensitivity, accuracy, and resolution in fiber optic sensors include manipulating the polarization characteristics of the light entering a fiber optic sensor and/or manipulating the polarization characteristics of the light exiting the sensor before it enters the light detection system. An apparatus according to the invention includes a fiber optic core having one or more gratings written onto it, a light source and a detection system for detecting light transmitted through the grating or reflected by the grating. The light source and the spectral demodulation system may be coupled to opposite ends of the fiber optic (transmission mode) or may be coupled to the same end of the fiber optic through the use of a beam splitter and terminators (reflection mode). Apparatus according to the invention include a polarizer and controller located either between the light source and the fiber or between the fiber and the detection system. Other embodiments of the invention include a depolarizing scrambler before the detection system so that the light entering the detection system is depolarized. According to other embodiments, two detection systems are coupled to the fiber by a beam splitter.
摘要:
Fiber optic grating sensor demodulation systems are described that offer high speed and multiplexing options for both single and multiple parameter fiber optic grating sensors. To attain very high speeds for single parameter fiber grating sensors ratio techniques are used that allow a series of sensors to be placed in a single fiber while retaining high speed capability. These methods can be extended to multiparameter fiber grating sensors. Optimization of speeds can be obtained by minimizing the number of spectral peaks that must be processed and it is shown that two or three spectral peak measurements may in specific multiparameter applications offer comparable or better performance than processing four spectral peaks. Combining the ratio methods with minimization of peak measurements allows very high speed measurement of such important environmental effects as transverse strain and pressure.
摘要:
A fiber grating corrosion sensor system which includes fiber grating corrosion and/or chemical sensors formed by writing one or more fiber gratings that are transverse load sensitive so that when corrosion occurs to a transverse stress applying sleeve there over, the transverse loading is relieved. The spectral signals from the fiber grating sensors change with variations in transverse strain providing a measurement of the degree of corrosion or change in chemical content.
摘要:
A system and method to sense the application of transverse stress to an optical fiber which includes a light source that producing a relatively wide spectrum light beam. The light beam is reflected or transmitted off of an optical grating in the core of an optical fiber that is transversely stressed either directly or by the exposure to pressure when the fiber is bifringent so that the optical fiber responds to the pressure to transversely stress its core. When transversely stressed, the optical grating produces a reflection or transmission from the light beam that has two peaks or minimums in its frequency spectrum whose spacing and/or spread are indicative of the forces applied to the fiber. One or more detectors sense the reflection or transmissions from the optical grating to produce an output representative of the applied force. Multiple optical gratings and detectors may be employed to simultaneously measure temperature or the forces at different locations along the fiber.
摘要:
A high speed secure fiber optic communication system that includes a coherent alarm system utilizes a pair of single mode fiber optic cables in combination with one or more light sources, phase modulators, detectors and polarization scrambling elements to form a Sagnac interferometer. The phase modulator is driven so that counter propagating light beams in the Sagnac loop experience a different optical path as they pass through the loop. When the two beams are recombined on the central beamsplitter of the Sagnac loop, the two beams interfere with each other and the data impressed as phase modulation on the light beams by the phase modulator is recovered as amplitude modulation on the output detector of the Sagnac interferometer. The coherent alarm system applies a relatively low frequency background signal to the Sagnac interferometer and watches for changes occurring to the background signal that indicate the presence of an intruder. Although the system is very secure, such coherent alarm systems with or without other alarms, intrusion control, random pathlength changes and the like can make undetected, unauthorized access to the system impossible with available interception techniques.