A Dual-Polymer Fiber Fizeau Interferometer for Simultaneous Measurement of Relative Humidity and Temperature

• Main Authors: Chao-Tsung Ma, Yu-Wei Chang, Yuan-Jie Yang, Cheng-Ling Lee
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Published: MDPI AG 2017-11-01
• Series: Sensors
• Subjects: Fiber Fizeau interferometer (FFPI); polymer; fiber sensor; fast Fourier transform (FFT); simultaneously sensing humidity and temperature
• Online Access: https://www.mdpi.com/1424-8220/17/11/2659

This paper presents a novel design method in which a dual-polymer fiber Fizeau interferometer (DPFFI) is proposed for simultaneously measuring relative humidity (RH) and temperature (T). Since the polymer is intrinsically highly sensitive to both RH and T, the polymer fiber Fizeau interferometer (PFFI) exhibits cross-sensitivity of RH and T. In general, it is difficult to demodulate the optical responses from both variations of RH and T using a single PFFI. If two PFFIs with different structures are combined, they will individually exhibit distinct sensitivity responses with respect to RH and T, respectively. The technical problem of analyzing multiple interferences of the optical spectra of the DPFFI and the individual sensitivity of RH and T to each PFFI is obtained using the fast Fourier transform (FFT). A mathematical method is applied to solve the simultaneous equations of the DPFFI, so that the two variables RH and T can be determined at the same time. Experimental results, indicating good sensitivity and accuracy, with small measurement errors (average errors of ~1.46 °C and ~1.48%, respectively), are shown, determining the feasibility, and verifying the effectiveness, of the proposed DPFFI sensor.