Table Of ContentPlastic Optical Fiber Sensors
Series in Fiber Optic Sensors
Series Editor: Dr Alexis Méndez, MCH Engineering, LLC
This series of practical, concise, and modern guidebooks encompasses all types of fiber optic sensors,
including fiber Bragg grating sensors, Fabry–Perot sensors, interferometric sensors, distributed sensors,
and biomedical sensors. The aim of the series is to give a broadly approachable, essential overview of
the fundamental science, core technologies, design principles, and key implementation challenges in
applications, such as oil, gas, and mining; renewable energy; defense/security; biomedical sciences; civil and
structural engineering; and industrial process monitoring. Scientists, engineers, technicians, and students in
any relevant field of practice or research will benefit from these unique titles.
Titles in the series
Fiber-Optic Fabry-Perot Sensors
An Introduction
Yun-Jiang Rao, Zeng-Ling Ran, Yuan Gong
An Introduction to Distributed Optical Fibre Sensors
Arthur H. Hartog
Plastic Optical Fiber Sensors
Science, Technology and Applications
Edited by Marcelo Martins Werneck, Regina Célia da Silva Barros Allil
For more information about this series, please visit
https://www.crcpress.com/Series-in-Fiber-Optic-Sensors/book-series/CRCSERINFIB
Plastic Optical Fiber Sensors
Science, Technology and Applications
Edited by
Marcelo Martins Werneck
Regina Célia da Silva Barros Allil
CRC Press
Taylor & Francis Group
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Library of Congress Cataloging‑in‑Publication Data
Names: Werneck, Marcelo Martins, 1949- editor. | Allil, Regina Célia da
Silva Barros, editor.
Title: Plastic optical fiber sensors : science, technology and applications
/ edited by Marcelo M. Werneck and Regina Celia S. B. Allil.
Description: Boca Raton : CRC Press, 2020. | Series: Series in fiber optic
sensors | Includes bibliographical references and index.
Identifiers: LCCN 2019030930 | ISBN 9781138298538 (hardback : acid-free
paper) | ISBN 9781315098593 (ebook)
Subjects: LCSH: Optical fiber detectors. | Plastic optical fibers.
Classification: LCC TA1815 .P53 2020 | DDC 681/.25--dc23
LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2019030930
Visit the Taylor & Francis Web site at
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Contents
Foreword ............................................................................................................vii
Series Foreword ..................................................................................................ix
Preface ...............................................................................................................xi
Editors ...............................................................................................................xix
Contributors .......................................................................................................xxi
ChaPtEr 1 Introduction: Why Plastic Optical Fibers? ........................................1
Hui Pan
ChaPtEr 2 Principles of Polymer Optical Fibers ...............................................21
Ricardo Oliveira, Lúcia Bilro, and Rogério N. Nogueira
ChaPtEr 3 Optical Fiber Sensing Principles .....................................................67
Daniel André Pires Duarte, Rogério N. Nogueira, and Lúcia Bilro
ChaPtEr 4 LED-POF-Photodiode as Sensing Elements in high Voltage
Environment .................................................................................93
Marcelo Martins Werneck
ChaPtEr 5 Current and Voltage Sensing ........................................................107
Marcelo Martins Werneck
ChaPtEr 6 POF Bragg Gratings ......................................................................131
David Webb
ChaPtEr 7 temperature Sensing by rubi Fluorescence ..................................153
Marcelo Martins Werneck
ChaPtEr 8 Gas Sensing ................................................................................171
Meysam M. Keley
v
Contents
ChaPtEr 9 Biological Sensing .......................................................................189
Regina Célia da Silva Barros Allil
ChaPtEr 10 POF Displacement Sensors ...........................................................221
Joseba Zubia
ChaPtEr 11 Chemical Sensing with POF ..........................................................251
Filipa Sequeira, Rogério N. Nogueira, and Lúcia Bilro
ChaPtEr 12 POF Sensors for Structural health Monitoring ...............................267
Aleksander Wosniok
ChaPtEr 13 POF and radiation Sensing .........................................................285
Pavol Stajanca
ChaPtEr 14 Microstructured POFs ..................................................................313
Maryanne Large and Marcelo Martins Werneck
ChaPtEr 15 POF applications ........................................................................353
Marcelo Martins Werneck
Index...............................................................................................................389
vi
Foreword
Congratulations on the publication of Plastic Optical Fiber Sensors. The field of sensors has been
increasingly important as the sensor technologies have become tremendously useful not only for
disaster countermeasures and sensing of constructions, but also for AI and IoT. Needless to say,
Professor Marcelo Martins Werneck is the leading expert worldwide in POF sensors. I am lucky
to have known him through annually held POF conferences (officially, International Conference
on Plastic Optical Fibers) since 1992. POF conferences are organized by the International
Cooperative of Plastic Optical Fiber (ICPOF), and Marcelo has been the committee member as
the delegate of Brazil. He organized the 22nd POF Conference in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, in 2013,
which was a great success.
The first plastic optical fiber (POF) was reported from Du Pont in the United States in 1960s.
The main purpose of the POF at that time was for illumination of light, because the light injected
into the core region of POF can transmit through the POF and illuminate from the end of the
POF. However, the attenuation (transmission loss) was as large as 1,000 dB/km, and the length
of POF was quite limited to a few meters. The main application was only decoration or toys.
The attenuation of POF is caused by the scattering loss and the absorption loss. In 1970s, rigor-
ous purification of contaminants in POF material was developed by several institutes, mainly
in Japan, and the scattering loss was remarkably improved. On the other hand, the absorption
loss attributes to the molecular structure of polymer, and is an intrinsic characteristic of poly-
mer itself. The main reason for the absorption loss was the absorption of light by the carbon-
hydrogen stretching vibration in polymer structure. Therefore, the dominant idea of eliminating
the serious absorption loss was the substitution of hydrogen for a much heavier atom such as
fluorine or chlorine. As a result, the absorption loss by the carbon-fluorine vibration shifted to
a much longer wavelength, which improved the absorption loss at the wavelength of laser so as
to be negligible. In the more than thirty years since then, low-loss POF made of perfluorinated
polymer has been developed, and the total attenuation including both scattering and absorption
losses achieved only 10 dB/km, which can transmit light up to 1 km.
We learn from history that the innovation of technologies that dramatically changed the
world is, in many cases, achieved by the innovation from the material side. For example, in the
1960s, the roll of vacuum tube was ended by the invention of semi-conductor material (transis-
tor) that opened the door to real electronics society. In the 1990s, a CRT television was replaced
by a liquid crystal display (LCD) by the invention of liquid crystal molecules. These are examples
that “the material changed the system.” Now we have a variety of POFs with different materi-
als (acrylate materials and fluorinated polymer, etc.) and different structures (step-index (SI)
and graded-index (GI) POFs) based on their inherent characteristics. Such POFs are mainly
used for various sensor applications and high-speed data transmission, utilizing the inherent
characteristics of polymer, such as easy handling and flexibility. For example, compared to silica
optical fiber, the thermal expansion and the isothermal compressibility of POFs are two orders
of magnitude greater, which means that such a POF can become an excellent sensitive sensor to
external information, such as temperature change or slight amount of stress.
vii
Foreword
POFs have additional advantages of high strain limit, high durability, and negative thermo-
optic coefficients. These unique properties of POFs have been utilized in various applications,
such as chemical/biological and radiation sensing as well as those of strain, temperature, and
displacement. For localized sensors that can be multiplexed, fiber Bragg grating (FBG) has been
implemented in POFs. Moreover, microstructured POFs (mPOFs) allow for single mode opera-
tion for a wide range of wavelengths, improving performances of POF sensors.
By reading this book, readers will have an in-depth understanding of POF in sensors. I hope
that this book opens up opportunity for many researchers, scientists, engineers, and students to
formulate new ideas for POF sensors.
Yasuhiro Koike
Keio University
Keio Photonics Research Institute
International Cooperative of Plastic Optical Fiber (ICPOF)
viii
Series Foreword
Optical fibers are considered among the top innovations of the twentieth century, and Sir Charles
Kao, a visionary proponent who championed their use as a medium for communication,
received the 2009 Nobel Prize in Physics. Optical fiber communications have become an essen-
tial backbone of today’s digital world and internet infrastructure, making it possible to trans-
mit vast amounts of data over long distances with high integrity and low loss. In effect, most
of the world’s data flows nowadays as light photons in a global mesh of optical fiber conduits.
As the optical fiber industry turns fifty in 2016, the field might be middle aged, but many more
advances and societal benefits are expected of it.
What has made optical fibers and fiber-based telecommunications so effective and perva-
sive in the modern world? Its intrinsic features and capabilities make it so versatile and very
powerful as an enabling and transformative technology. Among their characteristics we have
their electromagnetic (EM) immunity, intrinsic safety, small size and weight, capability to per-
form multi-point and multi-parameter sensing remotely, and so on. Optical fiber sensors stem
from these same characteristics. Initially, fiber sensors were lab curiosities and simple proof-of-
concept demonstrations. Nowadays, however, optical fiber sensors are making an impact and
serious commercial inroads in industrial sensing, biomedical applications, as well as in military
and defense systems, and have spanned applications as diverse as oil well downhole pressure
sensors to intra-aortic catheters.
This transition has taken the better part of thirty years and has now reached the point where
fiber sensor operation and instrumentation are well understood and developed, and a variety of
diverse variety of commercial sensors and instruments are readily available. However, fiber sen-
sor technology is not as widely known or deeply understood today as other more conventional
sensors and sensing technologies such as electronic, piezoelectric, and MEMS devices. In part
this is due to the broad set of different types of fiber sensors and techniques available. On the
other hand, although there are several excellent textbooks reviewing optical fiber sensors, their
coverage tends to be limited and does not provide sufficiently in-depth review of each sensor
technology type. Our book series aims to remedy this by providing a collection of individual
tomes, each focused exclusively on a specific type of optical fiber sensor.
The goal of this series has been from the onset to develop a set of titles that feature an impor-
tant type of sensor, offering up-to-date advances as well as practical and concise information.
The series encompasses the most relevant and popular fiber sensor types in common use in the
field, including fiber Bragg grating sensors, Fabry-Perot sensors, interferometric sensors, dis-
tributed fiber sensors, polarimetric sensors, polymer fiber sensors, structural health monitoring
(SHM) using fiber sensors, biomedical fiber sensors, and several others.
This series is directed at a broad readership of scientists, engineers, technicians, and stu-
dents involved in relevant areas of research and study of fiber sensors, specialty optical fibers,
instrumentation, optics and photonics. Together, these titles will fill the need for concise, widely
accessible introductory overviews of the core technologies, fundamental design principles, and
challenges to implementation of optical fiber-based sensors and sensing techniques.
ix
