Highly sensitive magnetic field sensors based on Fe2O3 nanorods grown on the surface of a tapered few mode fiber

A magnetic field (MF) sensor with a stable structure and high sensitivity has been proposed and experimentally verified. We used the water bath method to produce a layer of Fe2O3 nanorods on a tapered few mode fiber (FMF) surface to form a Mach-Zehnder interferometer (MZI). The experiment found that the nanostructure produced on the surface of FMF were particularly stable and firm. Under the action of an external MF, the magnetic permeability of a Fe2O3 nanorod will change, leading to a change in its refractive index, resulting in a linear shift in the resonance wavelength of MZI. The experimental results showed that the MF sensitivity of MZI reached -0.5348 nm/mT in 10 mT∼80 mT. In addition, MZI has a certain sensitivity to environmental humidity and temperature. A long-period fiber grating and a fiber Bragg grating are cascaded with MZI to achieve a simultaneous measurement of three quantities and eliminate their cross-sensitivity.