Multi-Bus Fiber Sensor Protection Network Operation With Robustness Analysis

This paper proposes a multi-bus fiber-optic sensor network, which could multiplex different types of fiber sensors, locate the failure position, and recover the sensing services of sensors in a network immediately and automatically to keep them working without being interrupted. It is composed of master and slave nodes, as well as working and backup fibers connecting them. We introduce the operation of the network and two light source distributions by explaining the internal structures of the master and slave nodes along with the sensor protection and the fault location process. Then, we analyze the probability distribution of working status for both distributions and propose a quantitative evaluation criterion called weighted average robustness for the robustness analysis of any fiber sensor network. Meanwhile, this paper demonstrates its feasibility by multiplexing three fiber sensor systems: 1) a distributed fiber-optic vibration sensor based on dual Mach–Zehnder interferometer architecture; 2) an optical frequency domain reflectometry sensor; and 3) three Fiber Bragg Grating sensors in this network at the same time detecting different parameters. We test the performance of the network in three scenarios by fabricating failures of the sensing and backup fibers intentionally to prove the feasibility of the structure. Furthermore, all the status of the network will be uploaded to the human–computer interface of supervisory computer by the master processor through USB in real time. Operators can also control the network through the interface remotely.