Patent ID: 8743372

Claim:
An apparatus, comprising: a. a housing; b. an optical fiber supported by or from said housing, wherein said optical fiber extends through a hollow interior portion of said housing; c. a spring-mass assembly comprising: i. a leaf spring; and ii. a proof mass operatively coupled to a central portion of said leaf spring, wherein an operative portion of said leaf spring and said proof mass are both located within said hollow interior portion of said housing, and a peripheral portion of said leaf spring is supported by said housing; and d. a whispering-gallery-mode-based optical resonator supported from said housing within said hollow interior portion thereof and in contact with a surface of said central portion of said spring-mass assembly, wherein said whispering-gallery-mode-based optical resonator provides for limiting a motion of said central portion of said spring-mass assembly towards an interior surface of said housing by generation of a reaction force responsive to a compression of said whispering-gallery-mode-based optical resonator between said central portion of said spring-mass assembly and said interior surface of said housing, said compression of said whispering-gallery-mode-based optical resonator causes a deformation thereof, an optical resonant frequency of said whispering-gallery-mode-based optical resonator is responsive to said deformation, a portion of said optical fiber is located proximally adjacent to said whispering-gallery-mode-based optical resonator, and said portion of said optical fiber located proximally adjacent to said whispering-gallery-mode-based optical resonator is sufficiently thin so as to provide for an evanescent coupling of light from said optical fiber to said whispering-gallery-mode-based optical resonator.