Measurement of concentration and temperature using a fiber loop ring-down technique with core-offset structure

Abstract

Fiber-loop ring-down spectroscopy (FLRDS) technique can be used for measurement by indirectly measuring the ring-down time. This is advantageous because it is free from fluctuations of the light source and has a high sensitivity. A novel sensing system for measuring the concentration and temperature based on the FLRDS technique and Mach–Zehnder interferometer (MZI) is proposed in this work. The intra-cavity losses were compensated, which depended on the erbium-doped fiber amplifier. The sensor head was a section of 4 cm single-mode fiber that was spliced into the fiber loop ring cavity in a core-offset way, and its characteristics were tested by experimenting with different solution concentrations and temperatures. The experimental results showed that the detection limit of this system is 0.0014 g/ml, in the range of 0.010–0.400 g/ml. In the temperature sensing experiment, when the temperature varied from 30–200 °C, a sensitivity of 1.83 μs/°C was achieved. This research demonstrated that the MZI-based FLRDS sensing system has a clear response to the solution and temperature; therefore, it provides a reference for the measurement of stress, pressure, curvature, and other physical quantities.