Fiber optic smart structures

Fiber optic sensor technology has experienced tremendous growth since its early beginnings in the 1970's with early laboratory demonstrations of fiber optic gyros and acoustic sensors and the introduction of the first commercial intensity and spectrally based sensors. These early efforts were followed by a tremendous growth of interest in the 1980's when the number of workers in the field increased from perhaps a few hundred to thousands. The result was the introduction in the 1990's of the first mass produced fiber optic sensors that are being used to support navigation and medical applications. The number of fiber optic sensor products can be expected to grow tremendously in the years to come as rapid progress continues to be made in the related optoelectronic and communication fields. This paper provides an overview of some of the technologies being used to support fiber optic sensor development and how they are being applied.