FPGA-Based High-Speed Optical Fiber Sensor Based on Multitone-Mixing Interferometry

We report a real-time high-speed fiber Bragg grating (FBG) interrogator based on a fiber-optic interferometer. The signal processing is performed by using a low-cost field-programmable gate array (FPGA) system, which is programed to implement a phase-generated carrier (PGC) demodulation algorithm with multitone mixing (MTM) to provide distortion-free signals with high tolerance to modulation depth variations and light intensity fluctuations. The system can stream data at rates up to 1 MS/s and allows multiplexed processing up to two channels. Experimental results show simultaneous measurements of two FBGs, one of which was actuated at frequencies up to 100 kHz. The system features a 3-dB bandwidth of 280 kHz, and a dynamic wavelength resolution of 4.7 fm/Hz ^{mathrm {1/2}}. We also demonstrate a strong reduction of distortion using the MTM approach with respect to the standard technique. Finally, we study the origin of the noise, demonstrating a reduction in common noise sources by using one of the FBGs as a reference. The system can measure FBGs centered at any position within the spectral band of the source, is polarization-independent, and is easily scalable to more than two measurement channels from the same interferometer.