Electromagnetic Modelling of Fiber Sensors for Low-Cost and High Sensitivity Temperature Monitoring

An accurate design of an innovative fiber optic temperature sensor is developed. The sensor is based on a cascade of three microstructured optical fibers (MOFs). In the first one a suitable cascade of long period gratings is designed into the core. A single mode intermediate and a rare-earth activated Fabry-Perot optical cavity are the other two sensor MOF sections. An exhaustive theoretic feasibility investigation is performed employing computer code. The complete set-up for temperature monitoring can be obtained by utilizing only a low cost pump diode laser at 980 nm wavelength and a commercial optical power detector. The simulated sensitivity S = 315.1 μW/°C and the operation range ΔT = 100 °C is good enough for actual applications.