Study on Multiplexing Ability of Identical Fiber Bragg Gratings in a Single Fiber

The multiplexing ability of a novel multiplexing fiber Bragg grating (FBG) method based on Optical Time Domain Reflecto meter (OTDR) and Time Division Multiplexing TDM technologies has been theoretically analyzed and studied. This method permits the interrogation of hundreds of identical FBGs with low reflectivity in a single fiber, making the FBG sensors more applicable in the aerospace health monitoring engineering. The analysis shows that the multiplexing ability can be greatly improved if the FBG reflectivity is sufficiently low. And hence, an inexpensive large-scale distributed sensing system based on this method can be realized. When evaluating the multiplexing ability of this system, we propose for the first time that the interference effect of multi-reflections among FBGs should be taken into consideration.