Simultaneous Measurement of Refractive Index, Temperature, and

Strain Using Etched-Core Fiber Bragg Grating Sensors

Sang-Mae Lee, Simarjeet S. Saini, and Myung-Yung Jeong

Simultaneous measurement is achieved by exciting higher-order modes in the sensor using a

taper and measuring differences in their Bragg wavelength shifts due to different parameters.
To measure these parameters, we excite the higher-order modes. The etching of FBG is done
using HF acid, simply dipping the FBG into HF acid.
 For numerical simulation, we use the following parameters:
Normalized Frequency: >2.405 (To support HOM)
Bragg wavelength: 1.5625 μm with FWHM 0.2nm
Core diameter: 8.3 μm (unetched end) to 5 μm (etched end)
Cladding diameter: 125 μm
Core index: 1.460
Cladd index: 0.36% of core (I,e. 1.454744)
Cladding index variation: 1.333 to 1.4547
Neff =1.4588 for lambda=1.55 μm
Length of grating: 6mm

* A. Iadicicco, A. Cusano, A. Cutolo, R. Bernini, and M. Giordano, “Thinned fiber Bragg gratings as high sensitivity refractive
index sensor,” IEEE Photon. Technol. Lett., vol. 16, no. 4, pp. 1149–1151, Apr. 2004.
Refractive index Sensor

 There is a non-adiabatic transition from the un-etched fiber to the etched fiber.
 After reflecting from the grating, part of HOM gets coupled to the fundamental
mode of the un-etched fiber and can be measured.
 The Bragg wavelength for HOM is shorter than the fundamental mode.
 For a given lambda HOM is more shift than the fundamental modes.
 Sensitivity is high if the core index is similar to the cladding index.

* A. N. Chryssis, S. S. Saini, S. M. Lee, and M. Dagenais, “Increased sensitivity and parametric discrimination using higher
order modes of etched-core fiber Bragg grating sensos,” IEEE Photon. Technol. Lett., vol. 18, no. 1, pp. 178–180, Jan. 1,
2006.