An Active Fibre-optic Interferometric Sensor Based on a Low Finesse Fibre-optic Fabry-Perot

Abstract

We demonstrate a novel active fibre-optic interferometric sensor based on a temperature-stabilized low-finesse fibre-optic Fabry-Perot. In this apparatus, information on the optical phase was extracted from the frequency shift of the He-Ne laser of which the cavity length was thermally tuned to compensate change in the interference signal. It is shown that an improvement in the stability of the interference signal by two orders of magnitudes can be realized. The tracking achievable between the Fabry-Perot interferometer and the laser was better than 1 part in 10⁸. That is, the relative frequency stability of the laser was ? 1·0 × 10^?8 over an interval of tens of minutes. Detection of a change of 5 nm in the optical path length of the fibre-optic Fabry-Perot was also demonstrated. The dynamic range of this interferometer is over 40 dB and the linearity characteristics are excellent. These performance characteristics were limited by the long-term thermal drift of the apparatus, not the low reflectivity of the fibre ends of the Fabry-Perot interferometer.