Optical fibre gratings can be configured to sense strain, bending, pressure, temperature and refractive index, which allows their use in a wide range of medical applications:
- We have used long period and Bragg grating bend sensors to construct a vest capable of monitoring the recruitment of various muscle groups to the breathing process
- Long period grating sensor can also be used to monitor the mechanical vibrations associated with cardiac activity
- Multiplexed Bragg grating sensors can be used to monitor temperature profiles and we were the first group to demonstrate this in-vivo.
- We were the first to demonstrate that fibre Bragg gratings can be used to detect the MHz frequency strains associated with medical ultrasound
- We have shown that the combination of refractive index sensitivity with a smart fibre coating can permit label-free detection of specific biochemical species and DNA
- Femtosecond laser micromachining and inscription technology developed in the group is being combined with grating based sensors to produce micro-fluidic lab-on-a-chip devices
General features of optical fibre sensors
Small diameter – 125 microns
suitable for minimally invasive surgery
Multiple sensors possible on a single fibre
In some cases hundreds of sensors can be integrated into a single fibre – the sensors can have an effective separation of less than a millimetre
Made of glass, an insulator
- immune to electromagnetic interference so can be used in a MRI environment
Can be made sensitive to a range of chemical and biochemical species
- fibres are given a coating producing an index change in response ot the target species
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