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Optics Communications 281 (2008) 744–749

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High-precision measurement system based on laser interferometer

for determining alcohol concentration of liquid solution
a,* b
Yen-Liang Yeh , Yen-Pin Lin
a
Department of Automation and Control Engineering, Far East University, Hsin-Shih, Tainan, Taiwan
b
Department of Mechanical Engineering, Far East University, Hsin-Shih, Tainan, Taiwan

Received 25 May 2007; accepted 7 October 2007

Abstract

This study develops a high-precision, non-destructive measurement technique based on a laser interferometer for determining the
alcohol concentration of a liquid solution from its refractive index. The optical metrology system is employed to measure the refractive
indexes of samples with known alcohol concentrations ranging from 5% to 95%. By applying regressional analysis to the experimental
results, an analytical expression is derived to describe the quadratic relationship between the refractive index and the alcohol concentra-
tion. An excellent agreement is observed between the experimentally determined values of the alcohol concentration and the analytically
predicted results. For an assumed laser interferometer resolution of 1 nm, the measurement resolution of the proposed metrology system
is found to be at least F = 0.0025%, which is significantly better than that of typical stereometry methods (approximately 1.0%) Further-
more, it is shown that the measurement resolution improves as the alcohol concentration reduces.
Ó 2007 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

Keywords: Laser interferometer; Optical path; Refractive index; Alcohol concentration

1. Introduction liquid contained within a triangular cell by measuring the

Liquid solutions containing alcohol are used in a variety
of applications, including germicide, cleaning agent, liquor,
and so forth. Importantly, the properties of these solutions
depend upon the amount of alcohol they contain, and thus
a requirement exists for reliable and straightforward tech-
niques capable of measuring the alcohol concentration in
different solutions. Conventionally, such measurements
are performed using stereometry techniques. However,
these methods have a relatively poor measurement resolu-
tion of just 1.0%. Optical methods offer the potential to
obtain higher-resolution concentration measurements by
relating the alcohol concentration of a liquid sample to
its refractive index. Various methods have been proposed
for measuring the refractive indexes of liquids. For exam-
ple, Grange et al. [1] determined the refractive index of a
*
Corresponding author.
E-mail address: yehyl@cc.feu.edu.tw (Y.-L. Yeh).
minimum deviation angle of a light beam passing through
it. However, obtaining exact measurements of the deviation
angle proved difficult. Moreels et al. [2] proposed a similar
technique in which the refractive index of a liquid con-
tained within a V-shaped groove in a prism was determined
by measuring the critical angle at the boundary between the
liquid and the prism. However, this method required an
accurate knowledge of the refractive index of the prism
material. Various researchers have proposed the use of
photodiodes to measure the refractive index of a liquid
based upon the displacement of a laser beam passed
through it. Nemoto [3] demonstrated the feasibility of this
method for measuring the refractive indexes of liquid layers
with thicknesses as high as 10.00 mm. Adopting a similar
approach, Docchio et al. [4] presented a simple technique
for measuring the refractive index of a liquid using a posi-
tion-sensitive detector (PSD). However, the measurement
results obtained using the methods proposed in [3] and
[4] were both rather inaccurate. Jang and Lu [5] presented

0030-4018/$ - see front matter Ó 2007 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.
doi:10.1016/j.optcom.2007.10.107
 Y.-L. Yeh, Y.-P. Lin / Optics Communications 281 (2008) 744–749
a simple measurement system comprising a laser interfer-
ometer, a stepping motor and a PC for obtaining highly
accurate experimental measurements of the thickness and
refractive index properties of optical birefringent wave
plates. In the proposed method, the refractive index of
the wave plate was determined by measuring the change
in the optical path length difference as the plate was rotated
through a known angle. In general, the measurement reso-
lution of interferometer-based systems is better than that of
PSD-based methods since interferometers have a typical
resolution of approximately 1 nm. Accordingly, the current
study employs a laser interferometer as the basis of a sim-
ple yet highly accurate optical metrology system designed
to evaluate the alcohol concentration of a liquid solution
on a real-time basis by measuring its refractive index.
The proposed system has the advantage of a straightfor-
ward optical setup and experimental procedure. The valid-
ity and accuracy of the proposed method is demonstrated
by measuring the refractive index of a sample with a known
alcohol content of 95%. Having verified its measurement
performance, the metrology system is then used to measure
the refractive indexes of solutions with known alcohol con-
centrations ranging from 5% to 95%. Based upon the
experimental results, an analytical expression is derived
to describe the quadratic relationship between the refrac-
tive index and the alcohol concentration. The feasibility
of using this analytical expression to derive the alcohol
concentration of liquid samples given a knowledge of their
refractive index values is demonstrated experimentally.
2. Measurement system
2.1. Structural design and experimental procedure
Fig. 1 presents a schematic illustration of the proposed
optical metrology system. As shown, the system comprises
a measuring length host, a beam splitter (Agilent 10706A),
two corner cube retro-reflectors, a stepping motor, a quar-
ter-wave plate, a plane reflector and a rectangular cell con-
taining the liquid sample. The light beam emitted from the
laser system enters the beam splitter and is split into two
linearly polarized light rays with different frequencies and
directions of vibration. The first beam, designated as the
reference beam (indicated by the broken line in Fig. 1), is
reflected from the beam splitter into one of the corner cube
retro-reflectors, which reverses its direction of travel such
that it re-enters the beam splitter and is subsequently
Fig. 1. High-precision optical metrology system for determining refractive index of liquid alcohol solution.
745
reflected back to the measuring length host. The second
beam, designated as the measurement beam (indicated by
the continuous line in Fig. 1), exits the beam splitter, passes
through the liquid sample cell and enters a quarter-wave
plate, which changes its state of polarization from a linear
direction to a circular direction. The circularly polarized
light beam is then incident on, and reflected by, the plane
reflector such that it passes back through the quarter-wave
plate, where its state of polarization reverts back to a linear
direction, and then re-enters the sample cell. The difference
in the vibrational direction of the linearly polarized light
beam as its passes through the sample liquid in its forward
and reverse paths, respectively, is approximately 90°. When
the linearly polarized measurement beam emerges from the
liquid sample cell, it re-enters the beam splitter and is split
into two beams. One beam passes directly to the measuring
length host, while the other is reflected into the second cor-
ner cube retro-reflector, where its direction is reversed such
that it re-enters the beam splitter. This beam is then
reflected back along its original path through the liquid
sample cell before finally arriving back at the measuring
length host. From the discussions above, it can be seen that
the measurement light beam passes through the sample of
interest on four separate occasions, i.e. twice in the forward
direction and twice in the reverse direction, and hence the
measurement resolution of the optical setup is significantly
improved.
The objective of the optical system shown in Fig. 1 is to
measure the refractive index of a liquid solution such that
its alcohol concentration can be derived. The measurement
procedure involves the following basic steps:
(1) The orientation of the beam splitter is adjusted such
that the incident light polarized in the vertical direc-
tion is transmitted toward the sample liquid cell,
while the light polarized in the horizontal direction
is reflected toward the corner cube retro-reflector.
(2) The position of the quarter-wave plate is adjusted
such that its fast axis is orientated at an angle of
45° to the horizontal axis.
(3) The position of the quarter-wave plate is adjusted
such that the measurement light beam enters the sam-
ple liquid cell vertically in its first pass in the forward
direction and then horizontally following its reflec-
tion from the plane reflector. Having been reflected
from the beam splitter, the light beam re-enters the
sample liquid horizontally and then passes back
746 Y.-L. Yeh, Y.-P. Lin / Optics Communications 281 (2008) 744–749

through the sample vertically following its reflection Substituting Eqs. (2) and (3) into Eq. (1), the change in
from the plane reflector. The light beam is then inci- the optical path length can be expressed as
dent in the measuring length host, causing the inter- " # " #
ferometer counter to be reset to zero. d1 d2
L¼2 0:5
 d1 þ 0:5
 d2
(4) Once the interferometer has been reset to zero, the ð1  a1 Þ ð1  a2 Þ
glass liquid
sample liquid cell is rotated through a known angle " # " #
h by the stepping motor and the corresponding d 1 cos b1 d 2 cos b2
2 0:5
 d1   d 2 ; ð4Þ
change in the interferometer readout is recorded. ð1  a1 Þ air
ð1  a2 Þ0:5 air
 2  2  
1 n0 sin h
2.2. Mathematical analysis where a1 ¼ n0 nsin 1
h
, a 2 ¼ n0 sin h
n2
, b 1 ¼ h  sin n1
 
Rotating the sample liquid cell in step 4 above changes and b2 ¼ h  sin1 n0 nsin 2
h
. The first term in Eq. (4) de-
the length of the optical path in the interferometer system. scribes the optical path length difference caused by the
Assuming that the cell has a perfectly rectangular shape, two glass plates in the sample cell, while the second term
the change in the optical path length is dependent on the describes the optical path length difference generated by
rotational angle, the refractive index and thickness of the the liquid alcohol solution. Finally, the third and fourth
two glass plates in the cell, and the refractive index and terms describe the optical path length difference induced
thickness of the liquid alcohol layer within the sample cell. at the two air–glass boundaries. Each time the laser beam
Fig. 2 presents a schematic illustration of the relationship passes through the liquid sample cell, the resulting change
between the optical path length difference through the in the optical path length difference can be calculated by
liquid sample cell and its angle of rotation. multiplying each of the four terms in Eq. (4) by the corre-
The change in length of the optical path, L, when the sponding refractive index, i.e.
rectangular liquid cell is rotated through an angle h is given " # " #
mathematically by d1 d2
    L ¼ n1  2  0:5
 d 1 þ n2  0:5
 d2
d1 d2 ð1  a1 Þ ð1  a2 Þ
L¼2  d1 þ  d2 " # " #
cos hd1 glass cos hd2 liquid d 1 cos b1 d 2 cos b2
     n0  2 0:5
 d 1  n0  0:5
 d2 :
d 1 cos /d 1 d 2 cos /d 2 ð1  a1 Þ ð1  a2 Þ
2  d1   d2 ; ð1Þ
cos hd 1 air cos hd2 air ð5Þ
where d1 is the glass thickness; d2 is the liquid thickness; hd 1 As described above, the measurement light beam passes
is the refractive angle of the glass; hd 1 is the refractive angle through the sample liquid on four separate occasions.
of the liquid; /d 1 ¼ h  hd 1 and /d 2 ¼ h  hd 2 , where h is the Therefore, the total optical path length difference is given by
angle of rotation. From Snell’s law, it can be shown that ( " # " #
n0 sin h ¼ n1 sin hd 1 ; ð2Þ d1 d2
TL ¼ 4 n1  2  0:5
 d 1 þ n2  0:5
 d2
n1 sin hd 1 ¼ n2 sin hd 2 ; ð3Þ ð1  a1 Þ ð1  a2 Þ
" # " #)
where n0, n1and n2 are the refractive indexes of air, glass d 1 cos b1 d 2 cos b2
n0  2  0:5
 d 1  n0  0:5
 d2 :
and the liquid sample, respectively. ð1  a1 Þ ð1  a2 Þ
ð6Þ
In fact, the actual optical path length difference is twice the
θ value indicated by the laser interferometer. In other words,
the value determined by the laser interferometer is half the
d1 actual path length difference, i.e.
φd 1 θd1
EL ¼ 0:5  TL: ð7Þ
d2
φd 2 θ d 2 From inspection, it is evident that Eq. (7) is a function of
the parameters n2, n1, d2 and d1, i.e. the refractive index
d1 and thickness properties of the liquid alcohol solution
θd1
φd 1 and the glass plates in the sample cell, respectively.

2.3. Eliminating contribution of glass plates to path length

difference measurement

Fig. 2. Relationship between optical path length difference through liquid The contributions of n1 and d1 (i.e. the refractive index
sample cell and rotational angle. and thickness of the glass plates within the sample cell)
 Y.-L. Yeh, Y.-P. Lin / Optics Communications 281 (2008) 744–749
to the optical path length difference measurement can be
eliminated by applying the following analytical procedure.
Initially, the cell is considered to be empty such that n2 = n0
and b2 = 0. Substituting the refractive index of air for that
of the liquid in Eq. (7), the corresponding optical path
length difference can be obtained as
( " # ple cell, the optical metrology system was used to measure
d1
EL0 ¼ 2 n1  2   d 1  n0  2
ð1  a1 Þ0:5
" #)
d 1 cos b1
 0:5
 d1 : ð8Þ
ð1  a1 Þ
The deviation between the optical path length differ-
ences of the liquid sample cell and the empty cell, respec-
tively, can be obtained simply by subtracting Eq. (8)
from Eq. (7), i.e.
DEL ¼ EL  EL0
( " # "
d2 d 2 cos b2
¼ 2 n2  0:5
 d 2  n0  0:5
 d2
ð1  a2 Þ ð1  a2 Þ
It is apparent that Eq. (9) is a function of the refractive in-
dex and thickness of the sample liquid only, i.e. the contri-
bution of the glass plates has been removed. Thus, given a
knowledge of the inner thickness of the sample cell (d2), the
refractive index of the liquid can be obtained.
3. Results and discussion
3.1. Determine inner thickness of liquid cell
The validity of the proposed metrology system was dem-
onstrated experimentally using a laser interferometer
(HP5929A) with a resolution of 100 nm under normal envi-
ronmental perturbations. As stated above, the refractive
index of the sample liquid can be determined from Eq.
(9) provided that the inner thickness of the sample cell is
known. This thickness value can be extracted inversely
from Eq. (9) by using the optical metrology system to mea-
sure the path length difference induced by a sample cell
containing a liquid with a known refractive index. Accord-
ingly, the sample cell was filled with water with a refractive
index of approximately 1.33128 [2]. To maximize the opti-
cal path length difference in the laser interferometer, the
sample cell was rotated through an angle of h = 10° during
the measurement process. (Note that the rotational angle
should not exceed this value since the glass plates in the
sample cell are uncoated [5].) The optical path length differ-
ence induced by the water-filled sample cell was found to be
ELwater = 740.8 lm. To eliminate the effect of the glass
plates on this measurement result, the measurement proce-
dure was repeated using an empty sample cell. In this case,
the optical path length difference was found to be
EL0 = 640.5 lm. Substituting ELwater, EL0, n2 = 1.33128
and n0 = 1.00028 into Eq. (9), and taking the angle of rota-
747
tion to be h = 10°, the inner thickness of the liquid cell was
determined to be dw = 83912.6 lm.
3.2. Experimental measurement of refractive index
Having determined the inner thickness of the liquid sam-
the refractive index of a liquid solution with a known alco-
hol concentration of 95% (Taiwan Tobacco & Liquor Cor-
poration) under room temperature conditions (25 °C). As
before, the sample cell was rotated through an angle of
h = 10° to maximize the optical path length difference in
the laser interferometer. The resulting optical path length
difference was determined to be ELalcohol-95% = 782.4 lm.
Substituting this value into Eq. (9) together with
EL0 = 640.5 lm and a value of n0 = 1.00028, the refractive
index of the alcohol sample was found to be 1.36067 [eth-
anol = 1.35867, 25 °C] [2]. The two results are in good
#) agreement and therefore the measurement performance of
the metrology system is confirmed. Having verified the
:
accuracy of the proposed metrology system, the measure-
ð9Þ ment procedure was repeated to determine the refractive
index values of liquid samples with alcohol concentrations
ranging from 5% to 95%. The corresponding results are
summarized in Table 1. In general, the results indicate that
the refractive index increases with an increasing alcohol
concentration. Fig. 3 illustrates the relationship between
the refractive index of the liquid samples and their alcohol
concentration in graphical form.
From Fig. 3, it is apparent that the refractive index and
alcohol concentration are related via a quadratic function.
By applying a regressional analysis, this function is found
to have the form
n% ¼ 0:00000230C 2 þ 0:00052463C þ 1:33053034; ð10Þ
where C is the alcohol concentration (%) and n% is the
refractive index.
Substituting a value of C = 95 into Eq. (10), the refrac-
tive index is predicted to be n95% = 1.35961269. In other
words, the error between the measured value of the refrac-
tive index and the analytically derived value is just
0.00105731.
3.3. Measurement resolution of metrology system
The measurement resolution of the proposed metrology
system was evaluated analytically by considering two sam-
ples with alcohol concentrations of 95% and 50%, respec-
tively. In both cases, the refractive index of air was taken
to be n0 = 1.00028 and the rotational angle of the liquid
sample cell was assumed to be h = 10°. As described above,
substituting a value of C = 95 into Eq. (10) yields a refrac-
tive index of n95% = 1.35961269. Substituting this value
into Eq. (7), and taking the rotational angle to be
h = 10°, the change in the optical path length difference
induced by a sample with an alcohol concentration of
95% is determined to be EL95% = 608.631 lm.
748 Y.-L. Yeh, Y.-P. Lin / Optics Communications 281 (2008) 744–749

Table 1
Experimental results obtained for refractive index of samples with alcohol concentrations in the range 5–95%
Alcohol concentration (%) ELalcohol  EL0 (lm) Refractive index (n) Alcohol concentration (%) ELalcohol  EL0 (lm) Refractive index (n)
0 640.5 1.33128 50 668.9 1.3512
5 642.9 1.33294 55 670.4 1.35227
10 646.8 1.33565 60 672.9 1.35406
15 647.4 1.33607 65 674.6 1.35528
20 654.7 1.34117 70 676.2 1.35642
25 656.4 1.34236 75 677.8 1.35757
30 657.7 1.34328 80 677.7 1.3575
35 662.7 1.3468 85 678 1.35772
40 663.9 1.34765 90 678.2 1.35786
45 666 1.34914 95 682.1 1.36067

alcohol concentration measurement is therefore

Fig. 3. Relationship between refractive index and alcohol concentration.
Assuming that the resolution (k) of the laser interferom-
eter is 100 nm, the analytically derived value of the change
in the optical path length difference should be increased
from EL95% = 608.631 lm to EL95% = 608.731 lm, which
corresponds to a change of the refractive index from
n95% = 1.35961269 to n95%r = 1.35968462. Substituting the
amended value of the refractive index into Eq. (10), the
corresponding alcohol concentration is found to be
C = 95.8393%, i.e. an increase of Cdiff = 0.8393%. Since
the laser interferometer is assumed to have a resolution
of 100 nm, the resolution of the alcohol concentration mea-
surement is F = 0.8393%. In other words, the measurement
resolution of the proposed metrology system is better than
that obtained by typical stereometry methods (approxi-
mately 1.0%).
Taking the case of the second sample with an alcohol
concentration of 50%, substituting a value of C = 50 into
Eq. (10) gives a refractive index of n50% = 1.35101184.
Substituting this value into Eq. (7) with a rotational angle
of h = 10°, the corresponding change in the optical path
length difference is determined to be EL50% = 668.629 lm.
As before, the laser interferometer is assumed to have a res-
olution of 100 nm and hence the value of the change in the
optical path length difference is increased from
EL50% = 668.629 lm to EL50%r = 668.729 lm, correspond-
ing to a change in the value of the refractive index from
n50% = 1.35101184 to n50%r = 1.35108308. Substituting the
amended value of n50%r = 1.35108308 into Eq. (10) yields
an alcohol concentration of C = 50.2423%, corresponding
to an increase of Cdiff = 0.2423%. The resolution of the
F = 0.2423%. Again, it is seen that the measurement reso-
lution of the metrology system is higher than that of typical
stereometry methods. Furthermore, it is apparent that the
measurement resolution of the metrology system improves
as the alcohol concentration of the liquid solution is
reduced.
When the resolution of the laser interferometer is
assumed to be 1 nm, the resolution of the metrology system
when applied to measure the alcohol concentration of sam-
ples with C = 95% and C = 50% is determined analytically
to be F = 0.0059% and F = 0.0025%, respectively.
As a further demonstration of the measurement resolu-
tion of the optical metrology system, the concentration of a
liquid sample (300 ml) with an alcohol concentration of
67% was performed. Note that the sample comprised alco-
hol and water in the ratio alcohol (95%, 211.6 ml) and
water (88.4 ml). In order to generate the maximum optical
path length difference in the laser interferometer, the
rotational angle of the stepping motor was again speci-
fied as h = 10°. The change in the optical path length differ-
ence induced by 67% alcohol was determined to be
ELalcohol–mix = 775 lm. Substituting this value into Eq.
(9), together with EL0 = 640.5 lm and n0 = 1.00028, the
refractive index was found to be nalcohol = 1.35534853.
Substituting this value of the refractive index into Eq.
(10) yields an alcohol concentration of C = 66.9662%, a
difference of just 0.0338% from the exact value of 67%.
4. Conclusion
This paper has presented a high-precision, interferome-
ter-based measurement system for measuring the alcohol
concentration of liquid samples. The major contributions
of the proposed method can be summarized as follows:
1. Both the optical setup and the experimental procedure
are straightforward.
2. The measurement method provides an on-line, non-
destructive means of determining the alcohol concentra-
tion of liquid samples.
3. In the proposed method, the alcohol concentration of a
liquid sample is extracted from the measured value of
 Y.-L. Yeh, Y.-P. Lin / Optics Communications 281 (2008) 744–749
the refractive index. The refractive index and the alcohol
concentration are related by a quadratic function of the
form.
n% = 0.00000230C2 + 0.00052463C + 1.33053034,
where C is the alcohol concentration (%) and n% is the
refractive index.
4. When the resolution of the laser interferometer is 1 nm,
the measurement resolution of the alcohol concentration
(50%) is at least F = 0.0025%. In other words, the mea-
surement resolution of the proposed system is higher
than that obtained from typical stereometry methods
(approximately 1.0%). Furthermore, the measurement
resolution improves as the alcohol concentration
reduces.
749
Acknowledgements
The financial support provided to this study by the Na-
tional Science Council of Taiwan under Grant Nos. NSC
95-2221-E-269-011 and NSC 95-2221-E-269-012 is grate-
fully acknowledged.
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[3] S. Nemoto, Appl. Opt. 31 (31) (1992) 6690.
[4] F. Docchio, S. Corini, M. Perini, R.S. Kasana, IEEE Trans. Instrum.
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