Waveguides, such as light guides, made entirely of elastomeric material or with indents on an outer surface are disclosed. These improved waveguides can be used in sensors, soft robotics, or displays. For example, the waveguides can be used in a strain sensor, a curvature sensor, or a force sensor. In an instance, the waveguide can be used in a hand prosthetic. Sensors that use the disclosed waveguides and methods of manufacturing waveguides also are disclosed.

An optical fiber sensor includes an optical fiber. The optical fiber includes a cladding having a cladding refractive index, and a plurality of fiber cores embedded in the cladding and extending along a longitudinal axis of the optical fiber. The plurality of fiber cores include a first subset of at least one first fiber core and a second subset of at least one second fiber core. The at least one first fiber core has a first core refractive index different from the cladding refractive index and a first core radius in a direction transverse to the longitudinal axis. The at least one second fiber core has a second core refractive index different from the cladding refractive index and a second core radius transverse to the longitudinal axis. The second core refractive index and the second core radius differ from the first core refractive index and the first core radius such that a temperature sensitivity of the at least one second fiber core differs from the temperature sensitivity of the first fiber core.

Aspects of the present disclosure describe Rayleigh-based DTSS that utilizes few-mode fiber (FMF), which supports multiple spatial modes. For each spatial mode, a wavelength-scanning configuration gives the relative wavelength (or frequency) shift between two consecutive measurements. The temperature and strain changes can therefore be separated through different temperature/strain sensitivities of various mode-pairs. Advantageously, Rayleigh-based DTSS according to aspects of the present disclosure removes temperature-strain ambiguity, enhances measurement accuracy, reduces errors. and enables new features for multi-parameter sensing.

A fastener health monitoring system includes a structure including a first component and a second component, one or more fasteners securing the first component to the second component, and an optical fiber arranged adjacent to the one or more fasteners. The fiber is configured to detect strain on the structure from the one or more fasteners. Strain patterns are derivable from sensed data from the optical fiber, and any deviation in strain value greater than a threshold value at a particular fiber position along the optical fiber is indicative of a missing, damaged, or loosened fastener amongst the one or more of fasteners corresponding to that particular fiber position.

A fiber includes M primary cores and N redundant cores, where M an integer is greater than two and N is an integer greater than one. Interferometric circuitry detects interferometric pattern data associated with the M primary cores and the N redundant cores when the optical fiber is placed into a sensing position. Data processing circuitry calculates a primary core fiber bend value for the M primary cores and a redundant core fiber bend value for the N redundant cores based on a predetermined geometry of the M primary cores and the N redundant cores in the fiber and detected interferometric pattern data associated with the M primary cores and the N redundant cores. The primary core fiber bend value and the redundant core fiber bend value are compared in a comparison. The detected data for the M primary cores is determined reliable or unreliable based on the comparison. A signal is generated in response to an unreliable determination.

The photonic integrated device comprises a substrate, a plurality of mechanical resonator structures on a surface of the substrate, exposed to receive sound waves from outside the device; a plurality of sensing optical waveguides, each sensing optical waveguide at least partly mechanically coupled to at least one of the mechanical resonator structures, or a sensing optical waveguide that is at least partly mechanically coupled to all of the mechanical resonator structures; an input optical waveguide on the surface of the substrate, coupled to the plurality of sensing optical waveguides or the single sensing optical waveguide, for supplying light to the plurality of sensing optical waveguides or the single sensing optical waveguide; at least one output optical waveguide on the surface of the substrate, coupled to the plurality of sensing optical waveguides or the single sensing optical waveguide, for collecting light from the plurality of sensing optical waveguides or the single sensing optical waveguide that has been affected by vibration of plurality of mechanical resonator structures.

In an optical fiber monitoring system which detects physical disturbance or other parameters such as temperature or strain of a fiber where a monitor signal is transmitted along the optical fiber and analyzed to detect changes which are indicative of an event, a method is provided for periodically checking proper operation of the optical fiber monitoring system. A fiber disturbance actuator periodically causes a pattern of disturbances of a portion of the fiber at a predetermined location thereon where the disturbance is characteristic of the event to be monitored. The monitor signal is analyzed to detect the pattern of changes and in the event that expected changes are not detected, a warning is issued that the intrusion detection system is not properly operating.

The present application provides a monitoring and protection system and an energy storage device. The monitoring and protection system is applied to at least one battery module and includes a temperature monitoring apparatus, a deformation monitoring apparatus, and a control apparatus. The temperature monitoring apparatus includes a plurality of grating temperature sensors, and each grating temperature sensor is arranged on a corresponding battery module to obtain a current temperature of the battery module. The deformation monitoring apparatus obtains a current deformation amount of each battery module, and includes a plurality of grating strain sensors, and each grating strain sensor are arranged on a corresponding battery module. The control apparatus controls a protective unit to perform a corresponding protective action according to the current temperature and current deformation amount.

The present invention relates to an optical fiber BOCDA sensor. A purpose of the present invention is to provide an optical fiber BOCDA sensor which uses two phase codes to control a correlation peak position, thereby further simplifying control design and device configuration and improving spatial resolution to enhance a sensing performance and detection accuracy in comparison with the prior art.

This application describes a fibre optic cable structure which is advantageous for distributed fibre optic sensing, for example distributed acoustic sensing (DAS). The fibre optic cable structure includes an optical fibre for distributed fibre optic sensing and is configured to comprise at least one longitudinal section of a first type, which exhibits a change in effective optical path length of the optical fibre of one polarity in response to a given applied force, and which is adjacent to at least one longitudinal section of a second type, which exhibits a change in effective optical path length of the optical fibre of the opposite polarity in response to an equivalent applied force. When used for DAS, the response of a sensing portion that includes sections of both the first and second types, will include or exclude certain wavenumber by summation, which provides a directional sensitivity to incident waves.