Fiber optic sensor based on a sagnac interferometer including a recirculating-ring delay line with an edfa

We present a theoretical and experimental investigation of a Sagnac interferometer incorporating a fiber optic recirculating-ring delay line with an erbium-doped fiber amplifier to increase the effective length of the Sagnac loop and thereby improve the low-frequency response. Theoretical calculations show that the low-frequency response of the interferometer is enhanced as expected. However, the noise penalty of using a fiber amplifier in the ring is quite high, especially at low frequencies. The signal-to-noise ratio at low frequencies, using a superfluorescent erbium fiber source, is demonstrated as increasing by a factor of 2 compared to a single-loop Sagnac interferometer with the same total length of fiber, but without fiber amplifier.