An optical fiber multisensor network for security applications

Reports an investigation of the performance of an optical fiber multisensor network using a simple frequency-domain multiplexing technique. The major limitation of this system is phase-error-induced crosstalk. Theory suggests that this error can be minimized by carefully designing the operational parameters (sensor loop lengths and modulation frequencies) to make the determinant of the operation matrix large. This has been experimentally demonstrated. For a security network monitoring a wide area, one wants to use a larger number of sensors in a system. The proposed method to minimize crosstalk makes this feasible, so that the system will be more practical for actual applications