Performance of Fiber-Optic Hydrogen Sensor Based on Locally Coated π-Shifted FBG

Pd-based alloy coating on optical fiber is widely employed for hydrogen concentration sensing. However, it is difficult to distinguish the Pd-based alloy expansion from hydrogen adsorption or thermal effect. In this article, a novel fiber-optic hydrogen sensor based on pi-shifted fiber Bragg grating (FBG) with locally coated Pd/Ta alloy layer, which enables an in situ temperature compensation, is proposed and experimentally demonstrated. The hydrogen sensitivity difference between the extremely narrow peak of pi-shifted FBG and the sidelobe wavelength is employed to realize the hydrogen concentration detection with temperature compensation. Theoretical simulation and experiment show that the hydrogen sensitivity of the structure can be enhanced by optimizing the partially coating length. When the alloy length is 2 mm for a 10-mm grating, the wavelength shifts of central and sidelobe 19.2 pm and 6.0 pm are achieved, respectively, at 1% hydrogen concentration. Maximum hydrogen sensitivity after temperature compensation of 13.2 pm is obtained. The proposed local-compensated method based on partially coating on pi-shifted FBG is particularly potential for oxygen-free environments with high requirement on hydrogen accuracy.