Diffuse reflectance infrared spectroscopy has gained traction in many industrial applications in the recent years due to the emergence of new generation of low cost handheld spectrometers that did not exist a decade ago. Real-time monitoring puts a limit on the sample preparation process especially with inhomogeneous samples in the food industry, like grains, hay, wheat and corn. The heterogeneity of the samples and the pseudo-random spatial arrangement of the grains in front of the optical interface, leads to prediction errors. The spatial variations depend also on the spot size of the diffuse-reflected scattered light from the sample that is collected by the spectrometer. A larger spot size leads to simultaneous averaging of a larger amount of spectrospatial information from different locations on the sample, leading to better repeatability and better prediction accuracy. Up to date, the Microelectromechanical (MEMS) based spectrometers reported in the literature have limited optical spot size, usually smaller than 3 mm in diameter. We report MEMS based FTIR spectral sensors with optical spot sizes of 6 mm, 10 mm and 20 mm working across the spectral range of 1350 nm to 2500 nm. The core spectral engine comprises monolithic MEMS chip, micro-optics for light coupling and a single photodetector in a tiny package. The optical head combines several miniaturized filament- based lamps and reflective optics for illumination. The sensors are compared and the 10-mm sensor gives an optimal performance with a Signal to Noise Ratio (SNR) of 4000:1 and spectrospatial photometric repeatability down to 0.02 absorbance units.
In this work, we investigate the optical reflectivity of deeply etched vertical mirrors using the effective medium approximation and the transfer matrix method. The reflectivity is studied versus the incident light wavelength for different metal film thickness ranging from 10 nm to 200 nm, grain to air volume ratio (or fill factor) ranging from 10 % to 100 %, and for 1, 2 or 3 effective metallic layers with different grain size. The model predicts that the reflectivity of the vertical mirror can be about 55% of its nominal expected value of the bulk metal reflectivity for a fill factor of 35% and a film thickness of 24 nm, which is equal to 4 times the skin depth at a wavelength of 1550 nm. A vertical mirror is etched and metallized on a silicon-on-insulator (SOI) wafer and its reflectivity is measured in the wavelength range of 1300 nm to 2100 nm, showing good agreement with the theoretical predictions.
In this work, a simple and straightforward method for determining the direction of rotation in ring laser gyroscope based on fiber ring cavity and semiconductor optical amplifier is demonstrated. The method depends on creating a virtual rotation in a certain direction using an acousto-optic modulator placed outside the ring laser cavity, therefore do not add extra losses, and thus does not affect the cavity’s finesse. The ring cavity supports two counter propagating beams sharing the same SOA gain medium. The acousto-optic modulator shifts one of the two counter propagating beams with an initial frequency bias with respect to the other. This corresponds to a virtual rotation in a certain direction. Therefore, if the RLG actually rotates in the same direction of this virtual one, the shift in frequency between the two counter propagating beams will increase. On the other side if the RLG rotates in the opposite direction to this virtual rotation, then this frequency shift will decrease.
The temperature dependence of the beating frequencies in multi-longitudinal mode hybrid semiconductor-fiber based ring lasers is studied theoretically and experimentally. The variation of the beating frequency with temperature is found to be smaller for larger cavity length and lower beating order. Measured frequency variation as low as -0.24 Hz/°C is obtained for cavity length of 2.7 km. The stability of the frequency is evaluated using the Allan variance technique. The measurement is carried out for different beating frequency orders. The lowest order beating frequency has about 20x better long-term frequency stability than the beating frequency of the 100th order.
Fiber lasers are gaining wide attention nowadays due to their high stability, high reliability, low cost and compactness. Frequency modulation of the laser system has many applications such as wavelength tuning, active mode locking, generation of optical frequency combs and fiber sensors in general. In this work, we report frequency modulation of fiber ring laser system using transmission-type corner cube in-plane MEMS phase modulator fabricated by DRIE technology on an SOI substrate. The fiber-coupled MEMS-based phase modulator is inserted in a multilongitudinal mode fiber ring laser, which has a free spectral range of 345 kHz. By varying the applied voltage on the MEMS device, a wide range of the frequency modulation index can be achieved.
Notch filters based on fiber-coupled Fabry-Pérot cavity are formed by a reflector placed in close proximity to a
dielectric-coated end of an optical fiber. This kind of optical filters is easy to tailor for a given application because the
external mirror has less mechanical and optical constraints. In this paper we present a fiber-coupled Fabry-Pérot filter
based on dielectric-coated optical fiber inserted into a fiber groove facing a metallized micromirror, where the latter is
driven by a high-speed MEMS actuator. The microsystem is fabricated using Deep Reactive Ion Etching (DRIE)
technology on SOI wafer. The optical axis is in-plane and the components are self-aligned. The DRIE etching depth is
150 μm; chosen for improving the out-of-plane stiffness of the actuator and increasing the micromirror optical
throughput. The MEMS actuator type is closing-gap while its quality factor is improved by slotting the fixed plate. The
actuator, therefore, achieves a travel distance larger than 800 nm and has a resonance frequency of 90 kHz. The notch
filter exhibits a free spectral range up to 100 nm and a notch rejection ratio of 20 dB around a wavelength of 1300 nm.
The presented device provides low cost wafer level production of the filter.
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