A NOVEL CONFIGURATION FOR A WIDE-RANGE HIGH-POWER FIBEROPTIC CURRENT SENSOR

In this paper it is discussed a new configuration for a fiber-optic cu rrent sensor (FOCS) which increases the linearity range of the device without decreasing its sensitivity exploiting an appropriate feedback loop; in this way the whole system behaves as a ''null-detector''. Mor eover, the effect of bending-induced linear birefringence is explicitl y taken into account in the design and optimization of the sensor. It is shown that the response of the experimental apparatus is practicall y temperature independent and that its bandwidth gets values higher th an 1 MHz.