We review the recent developments in the area of optical fiber grating sensors, including quasi-distributed strain sensing using Bragg gratings, systems based on chirped gratings, intragrating sensing concepts, long period-based grating sensors, fiber grating laser-based systems, and interferometric sensor systems based on grating reflectors.

Fiber grating sensors

In this paper, we describe the spectral characteristics that can be achieved in fiber reflection (Bragg) and transmission gratings. Both principles for understanding and tools for designing fiber gratings are emphasized. Examples are given to illustrate the wide variety of optical properties that are possible in fiber gratings. The types of gratings considered include uniform, apodized, chirped, discrete phase-shifted, and superstructure gratings; short-period and long-period gratings; symmetric and tilted gratings; and cladding-mode and radiation-mode coupling gratings.

Fiber grating spectra

The historical beginnings of photosensitivity and fiber Bragg grating (FBG) technology are recounted. The basic techniques for fiber grating fabrication, their characteristics, and the fundamental properties of fiber gratings are described. The many applications of fiber grating technology are tabulated, and some selected applications are briefly described.

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Fiber Bragg grating technology fundamentals and overview

We present a novel class of highly sensitive sensors based on long-period fiber gratings that can be implemented with simple and inexpensive demodulation schemes. Temperature, strain, and refractive-index resolutions of 0.65 °C, 65.75 μ∈, and 7.69 × 10−5, respectively, are demonstrated for gratings fabricated in standard telecommunication fibers.

Optical fiber long-period grating sensors.

Recent research on fibre optic long-period gratings (LPGs) is reviewed with emphasis placed upon the characteristics of LPGs that make them attractive for applications in sensing strain, temperature, bend radius and external index of refraction. The prospect of the development of multi-parameter sensors, capable of simultaneously monitoring a number of these measurands will be discussed.

https://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.1088/0957-0233/14/5/201/pdf

Optical fibre long-period grating sensors: characteristics and application

We present a new class of long-period fiber gratings that can be used as in-fiber, low-loss, band-rejection filters. Photoinduced periodic structures written in the core of standard communication-grade fibers couple light from the fundamental guided mode to forward propagating cladding modes and act as spectrally selective loss elements with insertion losses act as backreflections <-80 dB, polarization-mode-dispersions <0.01 ps and polarization-dependent-losses <0.02 dB.

Long-period fiber gratings as band-rejection filters

Long-period fiber gratings are used to flatten the gain spectrum of erbium-doped fiber amplifiers. A broadband amplifier with <0.2-dB gain variation over 30 nm is presented. We also show that a chain of amplifiers can be equalized, leading to a bandwidth enhancement by a factor of 3.

Long-period fiber-grating-based gain equalizers.

Optical fiber communication systems that use optical amplifiers are increasingly seeking high-performance devices that function as spectrally-selective band-rejection filters. For example, ASE filters that improve erbium amplifier performance and band-rejection filters in Raman lasers/amplifiers1 must have low insertion losses and low back-reflections. In addition, they must be relatively inexpensive to mass-produce and should be compact after packaging. While bulk-optic filters and short-period Bragg gratings2,3 can be used for some of the applications, all the aforementioned requirements are rarely met. In this paper, we present a novel class of photoinduced, long-period fiber gratings that function as highly-efficient band-rejection filters.

J. B. Judkins

Papers

Long-period fiber gratings as band-rejection filters

Long-period fiber-grating-based gain equalizers.

Long-period fiber gratings as band-rejection filters