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Sensors and Actuators B 133 (2008) 174179

An optical ber methane sensing system employing a two-step reference measuring method
Yi Jiang , Caijie Tang
Department of Optical Engineering, School of Information Science and Technology, Beijing Institute of Technology, Beijing 100081, China Received 21 February 2007; received in revised form 29 January 2008; accepted 5 February 2008 Available online 13 February 2008

Abstract An optical ber methane sensing system utilizing a super-luminescent diode (SLD) in the 1.33-m band and a ber FabryPerot tunable lter (FFP-TF) is developed. A two-step reference measuring method, which is based on differential absorption technique, is employed; a reference channel is introduced to eliminate the uctuation of the illuminant spectrum, and the reference wavelength acquired by tuning the FFP-TF is introduced to eliminate the environmental inuence. The two-step reference measuring method has improved the reliability and stability of the system. A minimum detectable methane concentration of 0.3% has been experimentally achieved. 2008 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.
Keywords: Optical ber sensor; Differential absorption; Methane detection

1. Introduction Explosion of dangerous gases is one of the most serious disasters that can occur in coal mines. Methane is the main component of harsh gases, and is inammable and explosive, with a lower explosion limit (LEL) of 4.90% and an upper explosion limit of 15.4% [1]. Detecting its concentration in time safely and reliably has an important effect on the safe operation of industrial mines. The most conventional approach to methane detection is using pellistor-based sensors which accelerate methane gas ignition with a palladium catalyst, and measuring the consequent rise in temperature. However, they are susceptible to surface poisoning and therefore require scheduled replacement. In addition, they need relatively high current power supplies with safety overheads and restrictions on the distances between the sensors and the power supply. It is also relatively non-selective since essentially any gas other than methane would be detected when catalyzed through interaction with palladium [2]. An optical ber gas sensor is highly recommended for methane sensing because of its advantages such as excellent remote monitoring at long distance, resistance to electromag-

Corresponding author. E-mail address: bitjy@bit.edu.cn (Y. Jiang).

netic interference and poisoning, and safety in ammable and explosive situations. An important method for the remote monitoring of methane is measuring its spectroscopic absorption [2]. Differential absorption technique [36] and wavelength modulation technique [7] have been introduced to increase the performance of the methane sensors. Most of the efforts have been concentrated on improving the sensitivity; however, that is not the key problem in the practical applications. Most of the existing optical ber methane sensors are capable of attaining the 25% detection sensitivity of the lower explosion limit of methane, which is normally required for any inammable and/or explosive gas sensor [3]. It is more important that the methane sensors should work reliably in the hazardous situations in the mines. Differential absorption technique is benecial due to its ability to eliminate the inuences of dispersion, perturbation of gas, and the transmission loss caused by dust, water vapor, optical ber, connectors, and sensor head, etc. Different ways of implementing this technique have been explored. In the differential absorption technique, the two wavelengths, one coinciding with one of the absorption lines of methane and the other shifting away from the absorption line slightly, can be obtained using two interference lters [3], a dual electrode wavelength tunable distributed feedback (DFB) laser diode [4], a wavelength tunable FabryPerot laser diode [5], or ber Bragg gratings (FBGs) [6]. It is required that the operating wavelength of the DFB laser

0925-4005/$ see front matter 2008 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved. doi:10.1016/j.snb.2008.02.009

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The signals of the measuring channel and reference channel, I1 () and I2 (), can be written respectively as I1 () = IT ()aC1 exp[()cl]K1 () I2 () = IT ()(1 a)bC2 K2 () (2) (3)

Fig. 1. Schematic diagram of the ber-optic methane sensing system.

should be highly accurate and steady. In addition, the methane concentration is derived from the ratio of optical powers at the two wavelengths, which is actually not only affected by the absorption of methane, but also by the uctuation of the illuminant spectrum and the variation of lters. In this work, we selected the 2 + 23 combination band of methane molecules, i.e. the band of 1.33 m, to carry out the measurements. Low-loss optical ber and masses of cheap optical ber components can be obtained in this wavelength band; therefore, a much cheaper sensing system can be realized. A super-luminescent diode (SLD) with a central wavelength of 1.3 m and a ber FabryPerot tunable lter (FFP-TF) available from Micron Optics Inc. are used to create a tunable narrowband light. A two-step reference measuring method has been designed: a reference optical channel is introduced to eliminate the spectrum uctuation of the SLD, and the signals at the measuring wavelength and reference wavelength are obtained by tuning the FFP-TF. The experimental results show that the system has high reliability and stability. 2. Two-step reference sensing system The schematic diagram of the proposed optical ber methane sensing system is shown in Fig. 1. The light from the SLD is ltered by an FFP-TF and then divided into two beams by coupler 1, a 2 2 optical ber coupler. One output of coupler 1 is transmitted through a gas cell, and another output is divided into two beams by coupler 2. One beam of coupler 2 is detected directly as a reference to eliminate the spectrum uctuation of the SLD, and another beam is reected by two series ber Bragg gratings (FBGs) with xed wavelengths and the reected light is used to calibrate the wavelengths. The three signals are sampled after being photo-detected and amplied, then are input into a computer. According to the BeerLambert law, when light transmits through a gas cell, the intensity of transmission light is expressed as [8] I () = I0 () exp[()cl] (1)

where IT () is the intensity of transmission light of the FFP-TF, a is the coupling ratio of coupler 1, b is the coupling ratio of coupler 2, C1 and C2 are the total optical efciencies of the light path from coupler 1 to detectors 1 and 2, respectively, while K1 () and K2 () are the optic-to-electricity efciencies of detectors 1 and 2, respectively. Firstly, Eq. (2) is divided by Eq. (3) to eliminate the uctuation of the illuminant spectrum, and the result can be expressed as f () = I1 () K1 () a C1 exp[()cl] = I2 () K2 () (1 a)b C2 (4)

Then, the differential absorption measurement is carried out. The absorption at the two different wavelengths, 1 and 2 , are obtained by scanning the spectrum with the FFP-TF. 1 is the Q branch of 2 + 23 combination band of methane, and 2 is a reference wavelength shifting from 1 slightly, at which there is no absorption. As the tuning time is very brief within a measurement and the two wavelengths are very close, (a/(1 a)b) (C1 /C2 ) can be regarded as a constant. Detectors 1 and 2 are of the same characteristic at wavelength 1 and 2 , so it is reasonable that (K1 (1 )/K2 (1 )) (K2 (2 )/K1 (2 )) = 1. Hence, the result of f(1 ) divided by f(2 ) can be simplied as f ( 1 ) = exp[(1 )cl] f (2 ) (5)

Here, there is no absorption at 2 , so (2 ) = 0. The concentration of methane can be deduced to be c= 1 f (1 ) ln (1 )l f (2 ) (6)

3. Absorption spectra of methane around 1.33 m Since the absorption coefcient is needed to calculate the concentration of measured gas, the absorption spectra of methane around 1.33 m ltered by FFP-TF should be studied rst. The absorption coefcient of one single absorption line of methane can be expressed as [5,9] i () = Si T0 NL g( i ) T (7)

where I() is the intensity of transmission light, I0 () is the intensity of incident light, () is the absorption coefcient of gas at wavelength in unit concentration and unit length, c is the concentration of the gas, and l is the length of the gas cell in which the light interacts with the gas.

where is the wavelength in wavenumber (cm1 ), i is the center of absorption line, Si is the line intensity (in cm1 /(molecule cm2 )), T is the environmental temperature (in K), T0 = 273 K, NL = 2.6868 1019 molecule/cm3 is the Lochsmidt number or the volumetric density under reference conditions, and g( i ) is the unit normalized line shape function. The line shape function describes the effect of line broadening as a function of the pressure. At atmospheric pressure, the main factor contributing to the broadening of the absorption line is the collision between the gas molecules, and g( i ) is completely determined by a

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Lorentzian prole with its half width at half maximum (HWHM) L . The Lorentzian distribution is expressed by [5,9] g ( i ) = L 1 2 ( i )2 + L (8) (9)

L = air (296/T )n Pt

where air is the air-broadened half width (cm1 /atm) at Tref = 296 K, the reference pressure Pt = 1 atm, and n is the coefcient of temperature dependence of the air-broadened half width. The integral absorption coefcient of methane at wavenumber can be written as [10] () =
i

i ()

(10)

Fig. 2. Comparison of the calculated transmission (solid line) and that of the experimental measurement (dotted line).

where the summation is performed over all relevant lines. The linewidth of the methane absorption line is comparable to that of the output light of the FFP-TF, so the decline of absorption coefcient owing to the wide linewidth of light must be considered. The fact that the spectrum of the FFP-TF follows the Airy function enables us to write the transmission light of the FFP-TF as [11] I T ( ) = Ii () 1 + [(2F/) sin(2nlc )]2 (11)

where Ii () is the incident light, F is the nesse of the FFP-TF, lc is the length of the FabryPerot cavity, and n is the index of refraction of the cavity material. When 2nlc 0 = m, where m is an integer, transmission light IT () has maximum IT (0 ). The free spectral range (FSR) = c/2nlc , where c = 3 108 m/s. As the linewidth of the FFP-TF is much narrower than that of the SLD, Ii () can be regarded as a constant Ii , considering the line shape of the transmission light of the FFP-TF. Hence, the transmission light of the FFP-TF with the peak at 0 can be simplied as IT () = Ii 1 + [(2F/) sin(c( 0 /FSR))]2 (12)

The transmission of light through 3.08% water vapor within an interaction length of 244 mm was also calculated utilizing the line-by-line parameters in HITRAN JavaHAWKS 2004 [12], which is shown in Fig. 3. The averaging absorption coefcient of water vapor within 13281329 nm is 0.06/m, while the absorption coefcient is 0.1/m at 1331.5 nm. Then, we can extrapolate that the differential absorption coefcient of water vapor is about 0.04/m for the system, which is about 1/30 of that of methane. As the differential absorption of water vapor is much weaker than that of methane, it is ignored in the system. The water vapor has an absorption peak at 1331.3 nm, 0.2 nm shifting from the selected absorption line of methane, with a maximum absorption coefcient of 0.15/m and a differential absorption coefcient of 0.09/m. However, it wont affect the measurements as the systems wavelengths are calibrated with two stable FBGs. 4. Experiments and discussions The feasibility of the sensing system shown in Fig. 1 is experimentally demonstrated. The light source is a 1.33-m SLD with a spectral width of about 50 nm and output power of nearly 1 mW. The bandwidth of the FFP-TF is 0.3 nm. The interaction length of the gas cell is 244 mm. The insertion loss of the FFP-TF is 1.2 dB, and the coupling loss of the gas cell through a pair of ber-optic collimators is 5.4 dB. The coupling ratio of coupler 1 is 80:20, and 80% light is injected into the gas cell. The two series FBGs, with the central wavelengths of 1318.240 nm and 1333.440 nm, respectively, are xed onto

The transmission of light through the gas cell can be expressed as T ( ) = IT () exp[()cl]d IT ()d (13)

The absorption coefcients () of methane at 296 K within a 13281335 nm region have been calculated by utilizing the lineby-line parameters in HITRAN JavaHAWKS 2004 [12]. For the FFP-TF in the experiment, F = 308 and FSR = 18436 GHz. The transmission of light through 3.08% methane standard gas within an interaction length of 244 mm was calculated and experimentally measured. The results are shown in Fig. 2, in which the X scale is in nanometers, utilizing the relationship between wavelength and wavenumber, = 1/. The results in Fig. 2 show good accordance at the minimum transmission level between the theoretical and the experimental results. The maximum absorption coefcient (1 ) was deduced to be 1.31/m at 1331.5 nm, which was selected as the absorption line of the sensing system.

Fig. 3. The calculated transmission of light through 3.08% water vapor within an interaction length of 244 mm.

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Fig. 4. The calibration signal obtained from two FBGs with xed wavelengths.

a thermoelectric cooling (TEC) module to obtain xed wavelengths. The wavelength-stabilized FBGs are used to calibrate the wavelengths of the FFP-TF. The measured absorption coefcient of methane has the maximum value of 1.31/m at 1331.5 nm. Experimental measurements are carried out with standard gas of 3.08% methane. The response of the FFP-TF exhibits a nonlinear hysteresis property owing to the piezoelectric transducer, and this requires additional calibration to be performed repeatedly. In order to calibrate the scanned spectra, two FBGs with xed central wavelengths were employed as a wavelength reference. A triangular waveform was applied to the FFP-TF. The wavelength calibration was carried out in the following way. First, the three sets of detected signals were sampled and input into the computer, and the data were then digitally ltered. The two peak positions of the calibration signal, N1 and N2 , corresponding with the central wavelengths m1 and m2 of the two FBGs, could be found by identifying the maximum intensity of the signal peak. The calibration signal reected from the two FBGs is shown in Fig. 3. Thus, the wavelength step between two adjacent sampling points of the acquisition data and the corresponding wavelength at position N are expressed as = m21 m1 N2 N 1 (14) (15)

(FIR) lter, which does not cause the absorption peak shift, was chosen to lter the divided signal for its linear phase response. If an innite impulse response (IIR) lter was used to process the noise, the absorption peak in Fig. 5 would shift by about 1 nm. The experimental results indicate that the digital low-pass FIR lter has suppressed the high frequency noise successfully and has preserved the absorption peak. The ltered differential spectrum is shown in Fig. 5(c). The X-coordinates in Fig. 5 are all changed to wavelength according to Eqs. (14) and (15) (Fig. 5). The minimum transmission around 1331.5 nm, corresponding with the selected absorption line 1 of methane, was obtained by identifying the minimum value of the transmission valley. The transmission at reference wavelength 2 was averaged within the 13281329 nm regions, in which there is no absorption for methane, as shown in Fig. 5(c). The average value was intro-

= m1 + (N N1 )

By using Eqs. (14) and (15), the X-coordinate of the set of sampled data in the measuring channel or reference channel, which is originally in the sampling sequence, can be changed in wavelength. The scanned spectrum of the measuring channel is shown in Fig. 5(a). There are intense noise and clear ripples in the signal. The serious noise resulting from the low power of the light source and the large loss of the gas cell can be suppressed by increasing the light power, reducing the loss of the gas cell, and improving the electronic circuit. However, the ripples cannot be removed because they come from the SLD itself. The output of the reference channel is shown in Fig. 5(b). There are also intense noise and ripples in the reference signal. The output of the measuring channel was divided by that of the reference channel to eliminate the uctuation of the illuminant spectrum, and then processed by a digital low-pass lter. A nite impulse response

Fig. 5. The optical spectra obtained by scanning the FFP-TF. (a) Output of measuring channel, (b) output of reference channel, (c) the ltered differential spectrum.

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Fig. 6. Dependence of the measured concentration on the normalized transmission intensity.

duced to suppress the noise of the reference transmission. Then, the concentration of methane was calculated according to Eq. (6). Measurements of dry air without methane were performed. After calculation, we can extrapolate the average value u = 0.14%, and the standard deviation = 0.055%, and the limit of detection as dened by IUPAC is cL = u + 3 = 0.3%. Measurements of standard gas with 3.08% methane were made over a 10-min period. The results show good stability with a standard deviation of 0.118% and an average value of 3.07%. The concentration is calculated with the transmission spectrum and the absorption coefcient of methane. As there are additional losses for the measuring channel in the practical application resulting from the long optical ber link and the dusty situations in the mine, measurements with different additional losses have been carried out to test the reliability of the system. The losses were induced by bending the ber at the positions between the rst coupler and the gas cell. The experimental results keep good accordance with the exact concentration of standard gas even if the intensity of transmission light is only 20% of the initial value, as shown in Fig. 6. However, the measurement results will be inaccurate when the intensities of transmission light are very small because of the low SNR. Hence, it is necessary to keep adequate transmission intensity in the measuring channel. Experiments were carried out at room temperature. Fluctuations of the environmental temperature may affect the absorption of methane and the loss of the measuring channel. However, it was found that the absorption of methane is not very sensitive to temperature [5]. The loss caused by temperature change has also been proved to have no interference in the measurement, as stated before. The temperature stability of the system was examined by putting the system in a room and outdoors. The temperature was 27.8 C in the room and 2.3 C outdoors, respectively. The experiments were carried out with the standard gas at a concentration of 3.08%, and there is no distinct difference between the measured results under the two conditions. The experiment should also be carried out at different methane concentrations. As methane is strictly controlled for

its explosive property, only standard gas of 3.08% methane is available in our lab. Gases of lower concentrations also cannot be prepared and measured with the standard gas because of a lack of the necessary equipment. However, measurements with dry air and with the standard gas were performed. The results show that a minimum detectable concentration of 0.3% can be achieved. During the test, the valve of the gas cell was unbolted, allowing the methane to escape, and the measured concentration was found to reduce to close to zero as time passed by. As the system outputs the concentrations of methane directly instead of voltage signals or current signals, although there is no experimental datum, it is deduced to have a linear response range over all concentrations. The system can complete one measurement in one second. Thus, the response time of the system depends on the diffusion velocity of the methane, which is mainly affected by the structure of the gas cell, the wind and whether a pump is used. In addition, in another experiment, the measurement system operated for more than two months without stopping. It has been demonstrated that the system is robust. 5. Discussion The detection sensitivity of the sensing system is limited by the SNR of the signals. The noises of the detected signals include the shot noise of the photodiode detector, the thermal noise of the resistors, the spectral density noise of the operational amplier, and the quantization noise of the analog-to-digital converter (ADC) [5]. As the thermal noise of the resistors, the spectral density noise of the operational amplier, and the total noise of the ADC are independent of the intensity of the transmission light, the increase in transmission power is signicant with the improvement of the SNR. As the spectral width of the SLD is 50 nm, and only a fraction of the spectrum was used, it is preferable to choose a light source with a much narrower spectral width. Additionally, an average over several measuring times can also reduce the noise and increase the detection sensitivity. Thanks to the reference channel, the sensing system is immune to the uctuation of the illuminant spectrum, as shown in Fig. 4. As only one FFP-TF is used as a wavelength-related component, the variation in characteristics of the lter does not give rise to measuring errors, which may be serious in traditional differential absorption techniques in which the different lters are used. Hence, the proposed sensing system has much better reliability and stability than traditional designs. Although we extrapolate that the differential absorption coefcient of water vapor is about 1/30 of that of methane, the absorption of water cannot be ignored in the high-sensitive measurement. The water absorption in the band of 1665 nm is lower than that in the band of 1331 nm, whereas the methane absorption in 1665 nm is higher than in 1331 nm. Thus, it would be better for the system to operate at a wavelength of 1665 nm. Although the experimental system operates at a wavelength of 1331 nm, for which the components are all available in our laboratory, the principle described in this paper is also feasible for a system operating at a wavelength of 1665 nm.

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Moreover, in addition to methane, various substances including acetylene (C2 H2 ), hydrogen iodide (HI), ammonia (NH3 ), hydrogen cyanide (HCN), carbon monoxide (CO), carbon dioxide (CO2 ), hydrogen sulphide (H2 S), hydrogen uoride (HF), hydrogen bromide (HBr), and water (H2 O) have absorption lines in the ultralow-loss region of silica optical bers. The light source, the FFP-TF, and the detector are all easily obtained in this region, so a similar system may be feasible in the detection of these substances, if an appropriate light source and different absorption wavelengths are chosen. 6. Conclusion An optical ber methane sensing system has been designed and demonstrated using an SLD in a 1.33-m band and an FFP-TF. A two-step reference measuring method based on the differential absorption technique is employed. Experimental measurements for a standard gas of 3.08% methane have been carried out with the sensing system. The experiment results indicate that this technique can eliminate the uctuation of the illuminant spectrum and avoid the inuence of environmental interference. The experimental system has good reliability and stability. A minimum detectable methane concentration of about 0.3%, i.e. 6% of the lower explosion limit of methane concentration in air, has been experimentally achieved. In addition, a similar system may also be feasible in the detection of any substances having absorption lines in the ultralow-loss region of silica optical bers, if an appropriate light source and differential absorption wavelengths are adopted. Acknowledgement This work is supported by the Program for New Century Excellent Talents (NCET) at the University of China. References
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Biographies
Yi Jiang received the B.A.degree in 1987 and PhD degree in 1996 respectively from Chongqing University, China. He is a professor in Beijing Institute of technology. His research interests include ber optical sensors, smart structures, and measurement instruments. Caijie Tang received his MS degree in physical electronics from Beijing Institute of Technology, China, in 2006. He is currently working toward the PhD degree in physical electronics at the same institute. His current research interest is focused on the optical ber sensors.