Quartz-enhanced photoacoustic spectroscopic methane sensor system using a quartz tuning fork-embedded, double-pass and off-beam configuration

Lien Hu; Chuantao Zheng; Minghui Zhang; Dan Yao; Jie Zheng; Yu Zhang; Yiding Wang; Frank K. Tittel

Photoacoustics (Jun 2020)

Quartz-enhanced photoacoustic spectroscopic methane sensor system using a quartz tuning fork-embedded, double-pass and off-beam configuration

Lien Hu,
Chuantao Zheng,
Minghui Zhang,
Dan Yao,
Jie Zheng,
Yu Zhang,
Yiding Wang,
Frank K. Tittel

Affiliations

Lien Hu: State Key Laboratory of Integrated Optoelectronics, College of Electronic Science and Engineering, Jilin University, 2699 Qianjin Street, Changchun, 130012, PR China
Chuantao Zheng: State Key Laboratory of Integrated Optoelectronics, College of Electronic Science and Engineering, Jilin University, 2699 Qianjin Street, Changchun, 130012, PR China; Corresponding author.
Minghui Zhang: State Key Laboratory of Integrated Optoelectronics, College of Electronic Science and Engineering, Jilin University, 2699 Qianjin Street, Changchun, 130012, PR China
Dan Yao: State Key Laboratory of Integrated Optoelectronics, College of Electronic Science and Engineering, Jilin University, 2699 Qianjin Street, Changchun, 130012, PR China
Jie Zheng: State Key Laboratory of Integrated Optoelectronics, College of Electronic Science and Engineering, Jilin University, 2699 Qianjin Street, Changchun, 130012, PR China
Yu Zhang: State Key Laboratory of Integrated Optoelectronics, College of Electronic Science and Engineering, Jilin University, 2699 Qianjin Street, Changchun, 130012, PR China
Yiding Wang: State Key Laboratory of Integrated Optoelectronics, College of Electronic Science and Engineering, Jilin University, 2699 Qianjin Street, Changchun, 130012, PR China
Frank K. Tittel: Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering, Rice University, 6100 Main Street, Houston, TX, 77005, USA

Journal volume & issue: Vol. 18
p. 100174

Abstract

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Development of a methane (CH4) sensor system was reported based on a novel quartz-tuning-fork (QTF)-embedded, double-pass, off-beam quartz-enhanced photoacoustic spectroscopy (DP-OB-QEPAS). A simplified and accurate numerical model was presented to optimize the DP-OB-QEPAS spectrophone and to enhance the detection sensitivity. A compact and fiber-coupled acoustic detection module (ADM) with a volume of 3 × 2×1 cm3 and a weight of 9.7 g was fabricated. A continuous-wave distributed feedback diode laser was used to target the CH4 absorption line at 6046.95 cm−1. With the combination of wavelength modulation spectroscopy (WMS) and second harmonic (2f) detection technique, the CH4 sensor system reveals a 1σ detection limit of 8.62 parts-per-million in volume (ppmv) for a 0.3 s averaging time with an optimized modulation depth of 0.26 cm−1. The proposed CH4 sensor shows a similar or even lower level in the normalized noise equivalent absorption coefficient (NNEA) (1.8 × 10−8 cm−1∙W/√Hz), compared to previously reported QEPAS-based CH4 sensors.

Published in Photoacoustics

ISSN: 2213-5979 (Online)
Publisher: Elsevier
Country of publisher: Netherlands
LCC subjects: Science: Physics: Acoustics. Sound; Science: Physics: Optics. Light
Website: http://www.journals.elsevier.com/photoacoustics/

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