Pilot demonstration of correlation-domain distributed temperature sensing using forward Brillouin scattering

Forward Brillouin scattering (FBS) has been regarded as a key tool for distributed sensing of strain, temperature, acoustic impedance, etc. To date, FBS-based distributed sensing has been experimentally reported only by time-domain techniques. In this paper, we demonstrate correlation-domain distributed temperature sensing using cascaded FBS seeded by backward stimulated Brillouin scattering (SBS). By localizing the backward SBS using synthesized optical coherence function, cascaded FBS can also be localized. In the proof-of-concept experiment, we detect a 104 m long heated section in a 397 m long highly nonlinear fiber.