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Abstract: Mainly three technologies are presently commercially available for pressure measurement with
fiber-optic sensors: intensity-based, fiber Bragg gratings and Fabry-Prot. The first one is probably the simplest and the cheapest but it is limited to applications where having 2 fixed or up to 4 flexible fibers is not an issue, whereas the two other technologies require only one fiber. With generally low sensitivity to pressure and prohibitive cost for non multiplexed measurements, fiber Bragg grating pressure sensors are still limited to marginal applications. Fabry-Prot technology is the best compromise offering at affordable price a great flexibility in terms of pressure ranges, high sensitivity and miniature size suitable for most applications including disposable medical devices.
Keywords: Fiber optics sensors; Sensors; Pressure; Intensity-based; Fiber Bragg grating; Fabry-Prot
1. Introduction
Pressure can be measured over a very broad range from 10-12 Pa (in extreme vacuum) up to 10+12 Pa (in explosions) and a very large number of electrical sensor types have been commercialized so far. To convert pressure induced mechanical deformation into an electrical digital signal, such sensor usually rely on different physical principles such as piezoresistive or piezoelectrical principles, inductive or capacitive principles, or even thermo-electrical or acoustic principles. All of these principles have a large number of technological limitations which restrict their full utilization for sensing pressure in environments with important electromagnetic interferences (EMI), elevated temperatures, harsh chemicals or explosion sensitivity. Most of those constraints are actually circumvolved by optical fiber sensors (OFS) which often offer also better long-term reliability and sometimes with the benefit of a smaller size. Being however slightly more expensive than conventional technologies based on electrical and mechanical principles, OFS are usually reserved to niche critical applications, where they remain the best choice. As a consequence, only the leaders of the OFS companies are presently successful to penetrate this exclusive market Despite challenges associated with the reality of those markets, an increasing number of OFS starts to become commercial success stories. Although temperature OFS are certainly the most widely spread in the industry with well-known applications ranging from industrial process control, energy, civil engineering to medical [1, 2], pressure measurement is probably the second most important physical parameter that is successfully addressed with OFS. Actually pressure OFS have gained new market shares only in the last past five years as new applications involving mainly medical disposable sensors are now commercialized. This paper will present the three main pressure OFS technologies that are commercially available as well as some associated applications.
21st International Conference on Optical Fiber Sensors, edited by Wojtek J. Bock, Jacques Albert, Xiaoyi Bao, Proc. of SPIE Vol. 7753, 775304 2011 SPIE CCC code: 0277-786X/11/$18 doi: 10.1117/12.895536
Although it seems that such technology could have the best of both worlds (advantages of optical sensing combined with ease of electrical connection), it is not without a high price to pay due to the intrinsic nature of the measurement itself: light intensity is always dependent on a lot of factors which are often hard to control. For instance, the measured intensity is directly linked to the light source which could fluctuate due to aging or temperature changes and the same apply also for the light detector. Changes in the reflectivity of the diaphragm mirror due to thermal effects or oxidation affects also the sensor long term reliability, especially if the sensor is subjected to high temperatures (>150C). The thermal expansion of the diaphragm, which could be made of metal or polymers depending on the application, could also induce unexpected apparent pressure shift, furthermore that positioning and orientation of the two fibers relative to the diaphragm could also be affected by temperature changes. The design and the encapsulation of the flexible membrane is therefore often critical and probably the biggest challenges to produce reliable sensors using this technology. This is particularly true if the sensor is used in a harsh environment such as for instance the one encountered in combustion engine chambers, where direct pressure measurement could help to improve the energetic yield by better sparkplug ignition timing capacity. In such harsh chemical environment, the sensor may be subjected to pressures up to 30 MPa with instantaneous gas temperature of about 1 500C and continuous temperature up to 300C. Besides long term (>10 years) reliability requirements with hundreds of millions cycles, the highest pressure on such application is probably the price: each cent decrease is significant for the automotive industry. This hurdle truly complicates the market penetration of this OFS technology for which a target price should be bellow 10$... Another source of intensity unexpected changes is directly linked to fiber losses due for instance to fiber bending, especially when large core fibers are used as often the case in order to maximize light intensity output. Such major drawback could however be avoided by fixing the optical fibers pathway (which is possible for instance in the above cited application) but such option is not always acceptable. For instance in medical instrumented catheters, the fibers have to be flexible and prediction of the intensity losses due to tortuous path is not possible. To solve this problem, one or two additional non-sensing fibers have to be added next to the other fibers to estimate the bending losses [3, 4]. Although theoretically not perfect due to local micro-bending issues, such approach is practically acceptable for adequate compensation, such the case for intensity-based sensors used for intra-cranial pressure (ICP) monitoring. This important application probably still represents the highest market for pressure OFS in terms of number of units sold per year. Since the brain is contained in the skull, a rigid container, any liquid accumulation such as blood or cephalospinal fluid (CSF) or mass lesions such as tumors, pus or hematoma may increase ICP. High ICP is a common cause of death in neurological patients and sustained high ICP suggests poor prognosis [5]. Forty percent of patients admitted unconscious have high ICP. In this group, high ICP will be the leading cause of death in half of cases [6] and effective treatment of high ICP was proven to reduce mortality [7]. As ICP varies continuously and especially at high ICP, a single measurement may be misleading and therefore, a continuous record of the ICP wave is necessary to avoid missing a sudden rise in ICP [5].
Fi igure 1: Example of F-P miniatur pressure sensor commercialize by FISO Techn es re rs ed nologies. Left: FOP-MIV ( 550 m); Cente FOP-M260 ( 260 m); Right FOP-F125 ( 125 m) L er: t:
The tr rend toward fur rther reduction of sensor size is particularly t true for medica applications. The added valu of integrating al ue g miniature pressure OFS into instrument catheters is now clearly a ted s accepted in field like cardiolo where the sensor provides ds ogy ssure measurem ments. Such app plications involving disposabl medical devi le ices, like for in nstance in intra aprecise in situ blood pres loon pumping t therapy [20] (I IABP) or in fra actional flow re eserve (FFR) e evaluation, requ low-cost still high-quality uire y aortic ball sensors m manufacturing ca apabilities. Suc challenges h ch have been solve by FISO Technologies whi now comm ed ich mercializes high hvolume of F-P pressure sensors for sev f veral OEM customers. Those sensitive senso (with flexib diaphragm made from thin ors ble n silicon) ar mass-produce on wafers u re ed using well-contr rolled photolith hographic techn nologies and ind dividually assem mbled at the tip p
of multimode optical fibers using fully automated assembly lines. As presented in Figure 1, several models with decreasing diameters from 550 m (FOP-MIV) down to 125 m (FOP-F125) are commercially available. For this FOP-F125 world smallest pressure sensor pushing further the size limits, the membrane is made from glass, which is more flexible than silicon, and assembled over a cavity carved at the tip of the optical fiber using patented technologies [21-24].
5. Conclusion
Several technologies are available commercially for pressure OFS. Each one has its own advantages and drawbacks as presented in this paper, but each one has found also some niche applications where it seems to be the best solution. However real commercial success for such sensor will come from high-volume repeated business and so far only medical applications involving disposable medical devices seems to offer such opportunity. For this specific market, F-P seems to be best positioned since it offers, at a price compatible with the market, great sensitivity sensors with miniaturization appropriate for simplified integration.
6. References
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