All-fiber hydrogen sensor based on stimulated Raman gain spectroscopy with a 1550-nm hollow-core fiber

We report a highly sensitive all-fiber hydrogen sensor based on continuous-wave stimulated Raman gain spectroscopy with a hollow-core photonic crystal fiber operating around 1550 nm. A pump-probe configuration is used, in which the frequency difference between the pump and the probe lasers is tuned to the S₀(0) transition of para-hydrogen with a Raman shift of 354 cm^-1. Preliminary experiments demonstrate a detection limit down to 17 ppm with a 250 s averaging time, and further improvement is possible. The all-fiber configuration operating in the telecommunication wavelength band would enable cost-effective and compact sensors for high sensitivity and high-resolution trace analysis.