Optical fiber acoustic sensor with gold diaphragm based Fabry-Perot interferometer

Abstract

This work proposes an optical fiber acoustic sensor using a Fabry-Perot interferometer (FPI), which consists of an optical fiber end face and a gold diaphragm with an effective diameter of 75 µm and a thickness of 20 nm. The sensor has contrast of up to 34 dB and achieves audible acoustic signal sensing over a broad frequency response range from 70 Hz to 20 kHz with a linear response to sound pressure. The minimum detectable sound pressure is 815.5 μPa/Hz1/2 at 70 Hz. The sensor made of a pure gold diaphragm has stable performance and can work consistently over a long period, promising to be applied as an optical microphone for real-time communication in some extreme environments.