Evanescent Wave Absorption Sensor Based Tapered Plastic Optical Fiber Coated with Monolayer Graphene for Ethanol Molecules Detection

An evanescent wave absorption （EWA） sensor based tapered plastic optical fiber （TPOF） coated with monolayer graphene film for ethanol molecules detection is demonstrated in this study. The continuous and monolayer graphene films were grown on a Cu foil by using chemical vapor deposition （CVD） technology. Polymethyl methacrylate （PMMA） was used as the carrier to support the transfer of graphene from Cu foil to the skinless tapered optical fiber core. The accuracy of the TPOF sensor with graphene （G-TPOF sensor） is much higher than that without gra- phene （TPOF sensor）, which can be attributed to the molecules enriched on the surface of graphene. The absorbance （A） and the concentrations of ethanol solution show an excellent proportional relationship in a range of 0--100%. The dynamic response of the G-TPOF sensor has shown strong reversibility, repeatability and stability at room temperature. The response time and recovery time of the G-TPOF sensor for different concentrations are all less than 30 s. Beyond that, we selected the Chinese liquor as the analyte, and the results are consistent with the concen- tration-list obtained in the experiment.

Humidity and temperature sensor based on GOQDs-PVA coated tapered no-core fiber combined with FBG

A simple structure optical fiber sensor for relative humidity(RH) and temperature measurement is proposed and verified in this paper, which is based on graphene oxide quantum dots and polyvinyl alcohol(GOQDs-PVA) composite coated tapered no-core fiber(NCF) combined with a fiber Bragg grating(FBG). FBG is insensitive to humidity and sensitive to temperature, which is used to compensate temperature of the sensor. Experimental results show this sensor has humidity sensitivity of 143.27 pm/%RH ranging from 30%RH to 80%RH and the temperature sensitivity of 9.21 pm/℃. The proposed sensor has advantages of simple structure, good repeatability, and good stability, which is expected to be used in both RH and temperature measurement in biological and chemical fields.

Graphene-and Multi-Walled Carbon Nanotubes-Coated Tapered Plastic Optical Fiber for Detection of Lard Adulteration in Olive Oil

A rapid and high-performance sensor for lard adulterant in edible oil was developed using the tapered plastic optical fiber(POF)coated with graphene and multi-walled carbon nanotubes.The coating material was deposited onto a tapered POF with a taper waist diameter and a taper length of 0.45 mm and 1 cm,respectively.The addition of the coating material was used to increase the sensitivity and selectivity coefficient of the tapered POF toward the lard substance.The sensing mechanism is based on a simultaneous interaction of lard substance and an evanescent wave of tapered POF with the coating layers.The results showed that graphene coating on the tapered POF increased the selectivity coefficient of the tapered POF towards lard substance from 33.54 to 324.19,and it gave a sensitivity of 0.427 dBm/%.In comparison,multi-walled carbon nanotubes coating increased the selectivity coefficient to 71.65 and increased its sensitivity to 1.189 dBm/%.Thus,the proposed configuration of the tapered POF with the coating material offered a simple configuration for a rapid,high sensitivity and selectivity detection of lard adulterant in edible oils.