High-Sensitivity Sensor Using Frequency Sweeping Generated Ringing Effect in Single-Mode Fiber-Loops

In this article, we present propose a simple method to detect the minor fluid-environmental changes using ringing phenomenon generated by frequency sweeping in a single mode optical fiber resonator. The method is based on the fact that the insertion loss of the optical fiber resonator is determined by the environmental changes alone, which leads to the changes of cavity ringdown time of the fiber resonator. The method has several conspicuous advantages over the frequency-domain method, using which the minimal detectable optical loss is in the order of .We also show that the sensing system is insensitive to the temperature drifting, which overcome the main defect of fiber loop resonator, that it is extremely sensitive to temperature changes. The structure of the sensor is compact and stable due to the characteristic of optical fiber resonator, and it is easy to apply because the structure is not delicate and is easy to construct.