A low-frequency acoustic sensing scheme based on cladding mode of large-angle tilted fiber Bragg grating

Abstract

A novel low frequency acoustic sensor based on the cladding mode of large-angle tilted fiber Bragg grating (TFBG) is proposed and verified in this work. It mainly uses the characteristic that the coupling mode of the core and cladding mode in TFBG is easy to change when the TFBG experiences micro-bend, which will finally causes a dramatic drift in the spectrum. By combining a large-angle TFBG with the designed polyethylene terephthalate (PET) transducer diaphragm and cavity structure, an effective low-frequency acoustic sensing system is obtained in this work. Under the action of applied acoustic wave, the transducer membrane will have periodic vibrations, which will makes the fixed TFBG dynamically bend, directly leading to a wavelength shift of the cladding mode spectrum. The experimental results show that the sensing system can achieve high-sensitivity acoustic detection in a frequency range of 45–220 Hz, and a maximum acoustic pressure sensitivity of 115.88 mV/Pa at 54 Hz. Moreover, the minimum detection sound pressure can achieve 539.2 μPa/Hz<sup>1/2</sup>@54 Hz. Therefore, the sensor has the advantages of high sensitivity, good repeatability, simple structure, easy processing, etc. It has a great development prospect in the low-frequency acoustic detection related application fields.