High precision micro-displacement fiber sensor through a suspended-core Sagnac interferometer

A sensing system for micro-displacement measurement based in a suspended-core fiber Sagnac interferometer is presented. The suspended-core fiber characterization was made through the use of an optical backscatter reflectometer, screening its multimodal and birefringent behavior. Its sensitivity to displacement measurements is shown to be due only to birefringence, being that core-cladding mode coupling is negligible. High precision (similar to 0.45 mu m) was obtained using three different measurement instruments, showing an extremely high stability and high insensitivity to temperature, demonstrating that the sensing system has the ability for low cost applications. (C) 2012 Optical Society of America