Investigation of a signal demodulation method based on wavelet transformation for OFDR to enhance its distributed sensing performance

Abstract

Optical fiber distributed sensing that is based on optical frequency domain reflectometer (OFDR) is a promising technology for achieving a highest spatial resolution downwards to several millimeters. An OFDR signal demodulation method that is based on Morlet wavelet transformation (WT) is demonstrated in detail to improve the resolution of distributed sensing physical quantity under a high spatial resolution, aiming at the trade-off between spatial and spectrum resolution. The spectrum resolution, spatial interval of the measured gauges, and spatial resolution can be manually controlled by adjusting the wavelet parameters. The experimental results that were achieved by the wavelet transformation (WT) method are compared with these by short time Fourier transformation (STFT) method and they indicate that significant improvements, such as strain resolution of 1 µε, spatial resolution of 5 mm, average repeatability of 4.3 µε, and stability of 7.3 µε within one hour, have been achieved. The advantages of this method are high spatial and spectral resolution, robust, and applicability with current OFDR systems.