Citation:
Chen-Chun Ye, Stephen E. Staines, Stephen W. James, and Ralph P. Tatam. A polarisation maintaining fibre Bragg grating interrogation system for multi-
axis strain sensing. Proceedings of the SPIE Smart Structures and Materials 2002: Smart Sensor Technology and Measurement Systems. Monday 18 March 2002, San Diego, CA, USA. Volume 4694, 195. Eds. Daniele Inaudi, Eric Udd
Abstract:
Fibre Bragg gratings (FBGs) written into polarisation maintaining (PM) fibres
have been employed for multi-axis strain and temperature sensing. In this paper
we report the development of a FBG interrogation system that is capable of
detecting independently the two orthogonally polarised signals reflected from a
PM FBG. The interrogation system imposes no limitation on the measurable strain
range. This relaxes the requirements on the bandwidth of the grating spectrum,
allowing the use of a shorter PM FBG (larger bandwidth) for sensing applications
where a higher spatial resolution is required. In particular, this system is
useful in the cases where the spectra of the reflected polarised signals are
broadened or split, resulting from strain-induced structural changes of the PM
fibre, or caused by the application of a non-uniform strain on the FBG.