A novel stable laser absorption spectroscopy (LAS) tomographic sensor with enhanced stability and spatial resolution is developed and applied to complex combustion flame diagnosis. The sensor reduces the need for laser collimation and alignment even in extremely harsh environments and improves the stability of the received laser signal. Furthermore, a new miniaturized laser emission module was designed to achieve multi-degree of freedom adjustment. The full optical paths can be sampled by 8 receivers, with such arrangement, the equipment cost can be greatly reduced, at the same time, the spatial resolution is improved. In fact, 100 emitted laser paths are realized in a limited space of 200mm×200 mm with the highest spatial resolution of 1.67mm×1.67 mm. The stability and penetrating spatial resolution of the LAS tomographic sensor were validated by both simulation and field experiments on the afterburner flames. Tests under two representative experiment states, i.e., the main combustion and the afterburner operation states, were conducted. Results show that the error under the main combustion state was about 4.32% and, 5.38% at the afterburner operation state. It has been proven that this proposed sensor can provide better tomographic measurements for combustion diagnosis, as an effective tool for improving performances of afterburners
