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OPTICAL GYROSCOPE [1 record]

Record 1 2001-08-20

English

Subject field(s)
  • Measuring Instruments (Engineering)
  • Optics
  • Navigation Instruments
CONT

A more advanced type of gyro is the optical gyroscope. These devices are based on two counter-rotating beams of light travelling in a ring-like structure. The interaction of the two light beams produces a standing wave pattern. If the ring is then rotated about its centre axis (think of a torus spinning around its core), one of the beams has to travel a slightly longer distance, and the other a slightly shorter distance to get back to where they started. This will cause a shift in the pattern of the standing wave, and this can be measured to determine the rate of rotation.

CONT

Most people would remember the classic rotating disc gyroscope, which belongs to the mechanical group. One of today's high precision gyros is still the mechanical, rotating gyro; however it is dependent on linear accelerations because of its mechanical measuring principle. The optical group comprises the fibre optic- and laser types. These use the Sagnac Effect (named after its French discoverer), which, when the sensor is turned, results in a difference in transit time between two light waves passing through the same optical path but in opposite directions. Optical gyros therefore do not depend on acceleration as gyros in the mechanical group. This is one of their biggest advantages ...

French

Domaine(s)
  • Instruments de mesure (Ingénierie)
  • Optique
  • Instruments de navigation
CONT

Réaliser un gyroscope optique d'un prix de revient de quelques centaines de francs. Voilà une prouesse technologique quand on sait que les systèmes actuels, les gyroscopes laser, coûtent entre 100 000 francs et 1 million de francs. La solution mise au point par Mohamed Bouamra, chercheur à l'École nationale supérieure de physique de Strasbourg, tient à une habile substitution de technologies : une simple diode électroluminescente remplace le laser, tandis que des banales fibres optiques multimodes prennent la place des coûteuses fibres monomodes.

CONT

[...] certains laboratoires ont étudié divers dispositifs de mesure des rotations absolues ne présentant qu'une analogie assez lointaine avec les gyroscopes classiques. Ce sont les gyroscopes à vibrations [...]; les gyroscopes nucléaires [...]; les gyroscopes optiques, exploitant les propriétés de la lumière cohérente [...]

Spanish

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