Fiber optic sensor for petroleum
AssigneeThe Board of Governors for Higher Education, State of Rhode Island and Providence Plantations
InventorsChristopher W. Brown, James J. Alberts
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Abstract
A silver halide fiber optic for the detection and identification of petroleum. The fiber optic serves both as a waveguide for transmitting a signal to and from petroleum in remote locations and also as an intrinsic part of the sensing element to obtain evanescent wave spectra. The evanescent wave is attenuated at various wavelengths based on the chemical composition of the petroleum in which the sensor is immersed. The spectrum obtained from an unknown sample is compared with the spectrum of known samples from a library to identify the unknown sample.
Claims5
A fiber optic sensor for the detection of hydrocarbons which comprises:
- a metal halide fiber optic having a refractive index greater than the refractive index of the hydrocarbons to be detected, the fiber optic characterized by a non-cladded portion;
- means to place the non-cladded portion in a sample containing hydrocarbons;
- means to transmit a signal through the fiber optic to and from the sample;
- and
- means to obtain an evanescent spectrum of the hydrocarbon sample from the non-cladded portion.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.