A self-healing architecture for fiber Bragg grating sensor network

Abstract

A self-healing architecture for fiber Bragg grating (FBG) sensor networks is proposed and demonstrated. We design remote nodes by using simple optical switches to check the breakpoint and reconfigure the FBG network if any link fails. Moreover, to enhance the signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) of the sensor system, we adopt a fiber laser scheme to construct our proposed self-healing architecture. The fiber laser adopted in this system leads to the SNR over 50 dB for the sensor system. The network survivability of a 10 point FBG sensor is experimentally verified. The proposed system can facilitate a reliable sensor network for a large-scale and multipoint smart structure.