Patent ID: 9470630
Filing Date: 2016-10-18
CPC Classification: G01D,G01M,G01N

Claim Text:
1. A sensor system for detecting degradation of a material of interest embedded in a structure, the sensor system comprising: an optical fiber; a housing through which the optical fiber extends; an optical time-domain reflectometer (OTDR) that injects a series of optical pulses into the optical fiber; and an end cap disposed at an end of the optical fiber such that the pulses injected into the optical fiber are reflected off of the end cap back through the optical fiber, wherein the end cap is made of the material of interest and has a thickness corresponding to a threshold level of degradation of the material of interest in the structure, and wherein the OTDR extracts from the optical fiber pulses that are reflected off of the end cap, and the OTDR determines, based on a distance from which the pulses were reflected, whether the material of interest has degraded below the threshold.