Design and characteristics of refractive index sensor based on thinned and microstructure fiber Bragg grating

A refractive index sensor based on the thinned and microstructure fiber Bragg grating (ThMs-FBG) was proposed and realized as a chemical sensing. The numerical simulation for the reflectance spectrum of the ThMs-FBG was calculated and the phase shift down-peak could be observed from the reflectance spectrum. Many factors influencing the reflectance spectrum were considered in detail for simulation, including the etched depth, length, and position. The sandwich-solution etching method was utilized to realize the microstructure of the ThMs-FBG, and the photographs of the microstructure were obtained. Experimental results demonstrated that the reflectance spectrum, phase shift down-peak wavelength, and reflected optical intensity of the ThMs-FBG all depended on the surrounding refractive index. However, only the down-peak wavelength of the ThMs-FBG changed with the surrounding temperature. Under the condition that the length and cladding diameter of the ThMs-FBG microstructure were 800 and 14 mum, respectively, and the position of the microstructure of the ThMs-FBG is in the middle of grating region, the refractive index sensitivity of the ThMs-FBG was 0.79 nm/refractive index unit with the wide range of 1.33-1.457 and a high resolution of 1.2 x 10(-3). The temperature sensitivity was 0.0103 nm/ degrees C, which was approximately equal to that of common FBG.