Enhanced Fiber Sensors with Nonlinear Anomalous Dispersion

Current state-of-the-art inertial measurement systems incorporate optical gyroscopes and high precision accelerometers.  These devices can contain no moving parts and can sense rotations and accelerations with high bandwidth.  However, there is a fundamental tradeoff between the size of an IMU and its sensitivity.  Highly sensitive gyroscopes are needed to meet navigation goals, but Size, Weight and Power (SWaP) are extremely precious resources in many platforms.  Using anomalous dispersion or fast-light effects generated in fiber with Stimulated Brillouin Scattering, we will enhance the sensitivity of optical IMUs for higher performance at lower SWaP than existing systems of comparable grade.  Previous results have shown sufficient fast-light effects with COTS components to demonstrate the technology, RLG operation under various conditions, and quantitative measurements of stability in a working prototype, but have not demonstrated absolute improvement in signal to noise ratio (SNR) upon introducing anomalous dispersion.  We propose to perform experiments to demonstrate unambiguous SNR improvement in the laboratory and develop designs of prototype IMUs which can meet strategic research goals for the Army and DoD.