Phase-sensitive optical time-domain reflectometry with Brillouin amplification

We propose a phase-sensitive optical time-domain reflectometry (Phi-OTDR) scheme with counterpumping fiber Brillouin amplification (FBA). High-sensitivity perturbation detection over 100 km is experimentally demonstrated as an example. FBA significantly enhances the probe pulse signal, especially at the second half of the sensing fiber, with only 6.4 dBm pump power. It is confirmed that its amplification efficiency is much higher than 28.0 dBm counterpumping fiber Raman amplification. The FBA Phi-OTDR scheme demonstrated in this work can also be incorporated into other distributed fiber-optic sensing systems for extension of sensing distance or enhancement of sensing signal level. (C) 2014 Optical Society of America