Integrated planar-optical networks in thin polymer foils — A new approach to large-area distributed sensing

Summary form only given. Optics and photonics are key enabling technologies of the 21st century offering great potential for new applications in fields as diverse as medicine, environmental and prognostic structural health monitoring or aeronautics, among others. Many of these applications require the implementation of highly-functional optical sensor networks ideally realized by using cost-efficient materials with tailored optical, rheological and thermo-mechanical properties and by employing high-volume production techniques. Intense interdisciplinary efforts are currently under way to achieve this goal and need to address all relevant aspects ranging from optics and photonics to material sciences and micro-production techniques.Our research in this field revolves about the development of planar-optronic systems, i.e. fully integrated, large-area structured polymer foils equipped with optical components and functionality suitable for distributed sensing and analytics [1]. Optronics in this regard implies the use of integrated optical and opto-electronic components, rather than electronics, such that the sensor concepts rely on purely optical means for signal generation, processing, and data transmission. A key aspect of such systems is that the properties of the quantities to be measured are directly converted into properties of light, e.g. intensity, wavelength or phase.