Vibration-insensitive polarimetric fiber optic current sensor based on orbital angular momentum modes in an air-core optical fiber

Abstract

Current or magnetic field sensing is usually achieved by exploiting the Faraday effect of an optical material combined with an interferometric probe that provides the sensitivity. Being interferometric in nature, such sensors are typically sensitive to several other environmental parameters such as vibrations and mechanical disturbances, which, however, inevitably impose the inaccuracy and instability of the detection. Here we demonstrate a polarimetric fiber optic current sensor based on orbital angular momentum modes of an air-core optical fiber. In the fiber, spin–orbit interactions imply that the circular birefringence, which is sensitive to applied currents or resultant magnetic fields, is naturally resilient to mechanical vibrations. The sensor, which effectively measures polarization rotation at the output of a fiber in a magnetic field, exhibits high linearity in the measured signal versus the applied current that induces the magnetic field, with a sensitivity of 0.00128 rad/A and a noise limit of 1×10−5/Hz. The measured polarization varies within only ±0.1% under mechanical vibrations with the frequency of up to 800 Hz, validating the robust environmental performance of the sensor.