BOTDA using channel estimation with direct-detection optical OFDM technique.

A novel Brillouin optical time-domain analysis (BOTDA) system without frequency sweep operation is proposed using intensity-modulated direct detection optical orthogonal frequency division multiplexing (IM-DD-OOFDM) probe signal. The influence of peak to average power ratio (PAPR) of OFDM probe signal on the recovery of Brillouin gain spectrum (BGS) is analyzed in theory and experiment. The complex BGS is reconstructed by channel estimation algorithm and Brillouin frequency shift (BFS) is located by curve fitting of intensity spectrum. The IM-DD-OOFDM BOTDA is demonstrated experimentally with 25 m spatial resolution over 10 km standard single mode fibers within much less measurement time.