Energy Harvesting Over Fiber From Amplified Spontaneous Emission in Optical Sensing and Communication Systems

Optical sensing and communication systems are essential for various applications in terrestrial, space, and submarine environments. However, integrating these systems poses several challenges, especially in terms of energy sustainability and management. In this work, we report on energy harvesting over fiber (EHoF) using amplified spontaneous emission (ASE) from erbium-doped fiber amplifiers (EDFAs). We demonstrate that the transmitted ASE power that is wasted in fiber Bragg grating (FBG) sensors and the ASE noise that is filtered out in optical communication systems can be harnessed for EHoF. We present a multi-functional system that includes EHoF, FBG-based sensing, fiber-optic communication, and underwater optical wireless communication (UOWC), and discuss the performance metrics of the different modules. This multi-functional system successfully harvests 6.12 mW of electrical power while enabling up to 2.5 Gbps of hybrid optical fiber and UOWC data communication with simultaneous temperature sensing using FBG in an underwater environment.