Novel Fiber-Optic Distributed Strain and Temperature Sensor with Very High Resolution

Yahei KOYAMADA
Yousuke EDA
Souichi HIROSE
Shinki NAKAMURA
Kazuo HOGARI

Publication
IEICE TRANSACTIONS on Communications   Vol.E89-B    No.5    pp.1722-1725
Publication Date: 2006/05/01
Online ISSN: 1745-1345
DOI: 10.1093/ietcom/e89-b.5.1722
Print ISSN: 0916-8516
Type of Manuscript: LETTER
Category: Sensing
Keyword: 
fiber-optic sensor,  distributed sensor,  strain sensor,  temperature sensor,  OTDR,  

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Summary: 
A novel technique is proposed for measuring the distributed strain and temperature in a fiber with a very high resolution. This technique makes use of the jagged appearance of Rayleigh backscatter traces from a single-mode fiber measured by using a coherent OTDR with a precisely frequency-controlled light source. Our preliminary experiment indicated the possibility of measuring temperature with a resolution of better than 0.01 and a spatial resolution of one meter. This temperature resolution is two orders of magnitude better than that provided by Brillouin-based distributed sensors.