Observation of photoacoustic/photothermal effect with a liquid-core optical ring resonator

Photothermal/photoacoustic（PT/PA） spectroscopy provides useful knowledge about optical absorption, as well as the thermal and acoustical properties of a liquid sample. For microfluidic biosensing and bioanalysis where an extremely small volume of liquid sample is encapsulated, simultaneous PT/PA detection remains a challenge. In this work, we present a new optofluidic device based on a liquid-core optical ring resonator（LCORR） for the investigation of PT and PA effects in fluid samples. A focused 532 nm pulsed light optically heats the absorptive fluid in a capillary to locally create a transient temperature rise, as well as acoustic waves. A1550 nm CW laser light is quadrature-locked to detect the resonance spectrum shift of the LCORR and study thermal diffusion and acoustic wave propagation in the capillary. This modality provides an optofluidic investigative platform for biological/biochemical sensing and spectroscopy.

Simultaneous multicolor photometry of fast-moving objects using the 1-meter telescope at Xinglong Observatory

Simultaneous multicolor photometry of fast-moving objects is discussed in this paper. In conventional astronomical photometry, the accuracy of flux and color indices of fast-moving objects is affected by the variations of the targets and weather conditions in space and time domains.We optimize related techniques and methods of observation and data reduction, including image cal- ibration, background fitting, targets detection and location, isophotal photometry, and flux calibration by using background stars from different fields. We consider that simultaneous multicolor data acquisition and differential flux calibration are critical for improving photometric accuracy of fast-moving objects. Our results show the photometric accuracy is better than 5% based on the observations carried out by a 1-meter telescope under ordinary, non-photometric conditions.

Magnetic field sensor based on peanut-shape structure and multimode fiber

An all fiber magnetic field sensor with peanut-shape structure based on multimode fiber(MMF) is proposed and experimentally demonstrated. The sensing structure and magnetic fluid(MF) are both encapsulated in capillary, and the effective refractive index of MF is affected by surrounding magnetic field strength. The measurement of magnetic field is realized by observing the wavelength drift of interference peak. The transmission spectrum generated by Mach-Zehnder interferometer(MZI) includes core-core mode interference and core-cladding mode interference. Experimental results demonstrate that the core-cladding mode interference is sensitive to magnetic field, and the magnetic field sensitivity is 0.047 8 nm/mT. In addition, two kinds of interference dips are sensitive to temperature, and the sensitivities are 0.060 0 nm/°C and 0.052 6 nm/°C, respectively. So the simultaneous measurement of magnetic field strength and temperature can be achieved based on sensitivity matrix.

Bearing-only Visual SLAM for Small Unmanned Aerial Vehicles in GPS-denied Environments

This paper presents a hierarchical simultaneous localization and mapping（SLAM） system for a small unmanned aerial vehicle（UAV） using the output of an inertial measurement unit（IMU） and the bearing-only observations from an onboard monocular camera.A homography based approach is used to calculate the motion of the vehicle in 6 degrees of freedom by image feature match.This visual measurement is fused with the inertial outputs by an indirect extended Kalman filter（EKF） for attitude and velocity estimation.Then,another EKF is employed to estimate the position of the vehicle and the locations of the features in the map.Both simulations and experiments are carried out to test the performance of the proposed system.The result of the comparison with the referential global positioning system/inertial navigation system（GPS/INS） navigation indicates that the proposed SLAM can provide reliable and stable state estimation for small UAVs in GPS-denied environments.