This thesis reports the research and industry-related works carried out from the development of a fibre-optic strain sensor system for Civil Engineering applications. A sensor system consists of a number of core components, including the sensing element, interrogation/demodulation, multiplexing, signal processing and hardware equipment. In the process of development, a number of issues have been identified and investigated, which resulted in the improvement of the system performance, as well as the proposal of new techniques for the sensor system. First, an improved demodulation technique for a type of sensor, namely the fibre Fizeau interferometer (FFI), is presented. The technique is based on the improvement of the Fourier transform peak detection method, which suffers severely from the poor resolution and accuracy of finding the sensor cavity length. The improvement over the original method has been compared and verified through simulations and experiments. Second, a simultaneous demodulation technique for multiplexed FFI and fibre Bragg grating (FBG) sensors using the discrete wavelet transform (DWT) is proposed. Third, a multiplexing technique using amplitude-modulated chirped FBGs and the DWT is proposed. These two proposed techniques have been demonstrated experimentally through strain measurements. The strain resolution, crosstalk and limitations are investigated. In addition, simultaneous quasi-static strain and temperature sensing of different metal plates are performed. Fibre-optic sensors have found numerous applications in different areas. In this thesis, the use of FBG sensors in Civil Engineering applications is demonstrated in four experimental studies, including: (i) long-term measurement of drying shrinkage and creep of structural grade concrete; (ii) simultaneous measurement of shrinkage and temperature of reactive powder concrete (RPC) at early-age; (iii) measurement of coefficients of thermal expansion of cement mortar and RPC; and (iv) field-trial on the strain monitoring of the world?s first RPC road bridge. In addition, the experimental and practical issues of using FBG sensors are considered.

Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Washington, 2006. / Vita. Includes bibliographical references (p. 140-144).

The main topic of this thesis is realization and characterization of fibre Bragg gratings. A novel versatile grating fabrication technique is developed and a number of gratings are realized, showing the potential of the system. Arbitrarily-shaped gratings are sequentially imprinted in the fibre by a moving interference pattern created with a continuous-wave ultraviolet (UV) source. This scheme allows for a very good control and stability of the grating shape, which is also shown experimentally. As opposed to most other present fabrication techniques, the proposed method offers a total control over the grating parameters by software, enabling simple implementation of new designs. Different kinds of error sources when stitching long gratings are identified and investigated regarding impact on the final grating result. Another important question within this field is how to characterize gratings. We propose a new characterization method based on optical low-coherence reflectometry (OLCR). A new interferometer design allows for simple simultaneous detection of the reflection response from two different points in the interrogated grating, so that differential measurements can be performed. The advantage of this is that the sensitivity to noise caused by e.g. thermal fluctuations in the system is substantially reduced. Several test gratings have been investigated and a very good agreement to the expected results is noted. A second characterization technique using interferometric detection of the side diffraction from the grating under test is investigated both theoretically and experimentally. With aid of two-dimensional theory for wave propagation, it is shown that there is a linear relation between the detected phase and modulation depth and the corresponding grating properties. The technique is evaluated with a novel scheme of implementation where the UV source provided in a fabrication setup is used assource for the side probe. This approach results in a very simple implementation and opens for an integration of the characterization and fabrication systems. Finally, a tuning method for transmission filters based on local heating of linearly chirped fibre Bragg gratings is analysed and further developed to allow for fully software-controlled operation. The potential of this technique is illustrated by some promising initial experimental results. / QC 20100812

I present a study done to determine the characteristics of the LHIRES III spectrograph on the 20 inch RC Optics telescope at Hard Labor Creek Observatory. I describe the settings of three different diffraction gratings, collimation and focus issues, and practical aspects of use. The spectrograph was used with a SBIG ST-8XME camera for all studies. Data collection was accomplished with the Maxim DL software package and analysis was completed with IRAF. Solutions for the dispersion relation with all three diffraction gratings were found. Several projects are underway with this instrument. I present time series spectra of α Vir to demonstrate the practical applications of the spectrograph. This non-radially pulsating star shows Doppler shifts that were recorded in the Si III 4552, 4568, 4574 Å triplet over the course of a night. The observed profile variations showed the spectrograph capable of exacting scientific work.

<p>We calculate electromagnetic transmission through periodic gratings using a mode-matching method for solving Maxwell's equations. We record the derivation of the equations involved for several variations of the problem, including one- and two- dimensionally periodic films, one-sided films, films with complicated periodicity, and a simpler formula for the case of a single contributing waveguide mode. We demonstrate the effects of the Rayleigh anomaly, which causes energy transmission to be very low compared to nearby frequencies, and the associated transmission maxima which may be as high as 100% for certain energy frequencies. Finally we present further variations of the model to account for the effects of conductivity, finite hole arrays, and collimation. We find that assuming the film is perfectly conducting with infinite periodicity does not change the transmission sufficiently to explain the difference between experimental and theoretical results. However, removing the assumption that the incident radiation is in the form of a plane wave brings the transmission much more in agreement with experimental results.</p> / Dissertation

Thesis (Ph. D.)--School of Electrical and Computer Engineering, Georgia Institute of Technology, 2004. Directed by Elias N. Glytsis. / Vita. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 179-190).

Thesis (M.S.)--Brigham Young University. Dept. of Electrical and Computer Engineering, 2003. / Includes bibliographical references (p. 183-193).

This thesis details original experimental investigations in to the interaction of light with the mobile electrons at the surface of metallic diffraction gratings. The gratings used in this work to support the resultant trapped surface waves (surface plasmon polaritons), may be divided into two classes: ‘crossed’ bigratings and ‘zigzag’ gratings. Crossed bigratings are composed of two diffraction gratings formed of periodic grooves in a metal surface, which are crossed at an angle relative to one another. While crossed bigratings have been studied previously, this work focuses on symmetries which have received comparatively little attention in the literature. The gratings explored in this work possesses two different underlying Bravais lattices: rectangular and oblique. Control over the surface plasmon polariton (SPP) dispersion on a rectangular bigrating is demonstrated by the deepening of one of the two constituent gratings. The resulting change in the diffraction efficiency of the surface waves leads to large SPP band-gaps in one direction across the grating, leaving the SPP propagation in the orthogonal direction largely unperturbed. This provides a mechanism to design surfaces that support highly anisotropic propagation of SPPs. SPPs on the oblique grating are found to mediate polarisation conversion of the incident light field. Additionally, the SPP band-gaps that form on such a surface are shown to not necessarily occur at the Brillouin Zone boundaries of this lattice, as the BZ boundary for an oblique lattice is not a continuous contour of high-symmetry points. The second class of diffraction grating investigated in this thesis is the new zigzag grating geometry. This grating is formed of sub-wavelength (non-diffracting) grooves that are ‘zigzagged’ along their length to provide a diffractive periodicity for visible frequency radiation. The excitation and propagation of SPPs on such gratings is investigated and found to be highly polarisation selective. The first type of zigzag grating investigated possesses a single mirror plane. SPP excitation to found to be dependant on which diffracted order of SPP is under polarised illumination. The formation of SPP band-gaps is also investigated, finding that the band-gap at the first Brillouin Zone boundary is forbidden by the grating’s symmetry. The final grating considered is a zigzag grating which possesses no mirror symmetry. Using this grating, it is demonstrated that any polarisation of incident light may resonantly drive the same SPP modes. SPP propagation on this grating is found to be forbidden in all directions for a range of frequencies, forming a full SPP band-gap.

Many applications in optical research require the use of diffraction limited point images with reduced spot sizes. The instrumentation that evaluates these small diameter images must have high resolution (sub-micron) capabilities. One method used to measure sub-micron optical point images is a scanning grating technique. However, many characteristics of this measurement technique have not been fully examined. In this paper, the sensitivity of this measurement technique to the scanning mechanism, beam characteristics, and grating tilt is evaluated.

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