Temperature Sensing in a Silica Microstructured Optical Fiber Based on Soliton Self-Frequency Shift

This article presented an investigation of nonlinear temperature sensing based on soliton self-frequency shift (SSFS) in an in-house fabricated microstructured optical fiber (MOF), and the sensing performance was evaluated by detecting the peak wavelength shift of soliton with the variation of temperature. Both theoretical simulation and experimental research were carried out and there was a good correspondence between the two results. The experimental sensitivity was as high as 0.451 nm/°C at 400 mW with a resolution of 0.2653 °C. Our work is a proof of concept of the optical fiber nonlinear phenomenon of SSFS to sensing technology. This temperature sensor does not involve additional fiber modification, and it has potential applications in biomedical, security, and harsh industrial environment.