Rayleigh backscattering in a fiber gyroscope with limited coherence sources

Noise due to temporal fluctuations of Rayleigh baekscattered light in fiber-optical gyroscopes is studied experimentally with various sources whose coherence length is less than the fiber length. The reduction of the coherent fraction of backscattered light and its fluctuation frequencies with reduced source coherence is demonstrated and fit to an analytical model. Measured backscatter parameters for the fiber and sources used are presented.