Experimental study of temperature response of a microfiber coupler sensor with a liquid crystal overlay

Yuliya Semenova; Lin Bo; Pengfei Wang; Sunish Mathews; Qiang Wu; Mianzhen Teng; Chongxiu Yu; Gerald Farrell

doi:10.1117/12.2026008

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20 May 2013 Experimental study of temperature response of a microfiber coupler sensor with a liquid crystal overlay

Yuliya Semenova; Lin Bo; Pengfei Wang; Sunish Mathews; Qiang Wu; Mianzhen Teng; Chongxiu Yu; Gerald Farrell

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Proceedings Volume 8794, Fifth European Workshop on Optical Fibre Sensors; 87942L (2013) https://doi.org/10.1117/12.2026008
Event: Fifth European Workshop on Optical Fibre Sensors, 2013, Krakow, Poland

Abstract

The paper presents the results of experimental studies of the temperature dependence of a microfibre coupler (MFC) with a waist diameter of ~4 μm covered with a layer of liquid crystal (LC) material. The microfiber coupler is fabricated by fusing together and tapering of two standard telecom fibers using a microheater brushing technique, followed by partially embedding the structure in a low-refractive index UV curable polymer (Efiron PC-363) for stability and later by placing a thin heated LC layer over the polymer-free uniform taper waist region. The temperature dependence of the embedded in polymer MFC sensor before the application of the LC layer demonstrates a redshift of the coupler’s spectrum with an average sensitivity of ~0.5 nm/°C in the temperature range of 14-70 °C. The application of the LC overlay increases the average temperature sensitivity to ~0.7 nm/°C. The demonstrated device offers several advantages such as ease of fabrication and light coupling, the potential for better stability and the possibility of electric field tuning for realizing temperature, electric field, bio-, chemical sensors and tunable add-drop filters for fiber communication systems. Further work is ongoing to explore various tuning mechanisms of the MFC spectrum.

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Yuliya Semenova, Lin Bo, Pengfei Wang, Sunish Mathews, Qiang Wu, Mianzhen Teng, Chongxiu Yu, and Gerald Farrell "Experimental study of temperature response of a microfiber coupler sensor with a liquid crystal overlay", Proc. SPIE 8794, Fifth European Workshop on Optical Fibre Sensors, 87942L (20 May 2013); https://doi.org/10.1117/12.2026008

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