Influence of the wavelength-dependence of fiber couplers on the background signal in wavelength modulation spectroscopy with RAM-nulling.

Recently a technique to optically eliminate the background residual amplitude modulation in 1f wavelength modulation spectroscopy was demonstrated, where perfect elimination throughout the scan range was not achieved due to the wavelength-dependence of couplers and that of the laser intensity modulation. This paper theoretically analyzes the technique and experimentally demonstrates that the elimination can be perfect for one of three possible experimental configurations, making this important for potential applications with some recently-developed laser sources. For the other configurations a non-zero background slope is predicted, experimentally verified, and the anomalous nature of signals is thereby explained. A common signal normalization method is devised that is independent of the signal slope, a fact that is important for industrial deployment of such systems.

Suppression of intensity modulation contributions to signals in second harmonic wavelength modulation spectroscopy.

Recovery of the full 2f wavelength modulation spectroscopy (WMS) signal in isolation from the 2f residual amplitude modulation (RAM) due to nonlinear intensity modulation (IM) and distortion due to linear IM is demonstrated. The 2f RAM is eliminated using a fiber delay line, while the linear IM-induced distortion is eliminated by a phasor decomposition approach. This generic and robust two-pronged strategy removes the need to separately measure the 2f RAM in high-modulation-index calibration-free 2f WMS. It is also important for widely tunable 2f WMS using nontelecom diode lasers with highly nonlinear characteristics leading to high-2f RAM levels.

Elimination of residual amplitude modulation in tunable diode laser wavelength modulation spectroscopy using an optical fiber delay line.

A new fiber-optic technique to eliminate residual amplitude modulation in tunable diode laser wavelength modulation spectroscopy is presented. The modulated laser output is split to pass in parallel through the gas measurement cell and an optical fiber delay line, with the modulation frequency / delay chosen to introduce a relative phase shift of pi between them. The two signals are balanced using a variable attenuator and recombined through a fiber coupler. In the absence of gas, the direct laser intensity modulation cancels, thereby eliminating the high background. The presence of gas induces a concentration-dependent imbalance at the coupler's output from which the absolute absorption profile is directly recovered with high accuracy using 1f detection.