Improving OFDR spatial resolution by reducing external clock sampling error

Utilizing an auxiliary interferometer to produce external clock signals as the data acquirement clock is widely used to compensate the nonlinearity of the tunable laser source (TLS) in optical frequency domain reflectometry (OFDR). However, this method is not always accurate because of the large optical length difference of both arms in the auxiliary interferometer. To investigate the deviation, we study the source and influence of the external clock sampling error in OFDR system. Based on the model, we find that the sampling error declines with the increase of the TLS's optical frequency tuning rate. The spatial resolution can be as high as 4.8 cm and the strain sensing location accuracy can be up to 0.15 m at the measurement length of 310 m under the minimum sampling error with the optical frequency tuning rate of 2500 GHz/s. Hence, the spatial resolution can be improved by reducing external clock sampling error in OFDR system.