A comparative assessment of classification methods for resonance frequency prediction of Langevin piezoelectric transducers

A Langevin piezoelectric transducer is used as a physical element for transmitting and receiving sound waves. The operating frequency of a transducer determines the distance that the sound wave can travel, so it is important to measure it. Due to the fact the structure of a transducer is quite complicated, it is quite difficult to estimate the precise physical parameters for the simulation model. Therefore, it takes a long time to measure the resonance frequency in the laboratory and fix the parameters by trial and error methods. This study applies a learning method to estimate a transducer frequency instead by trial and error experiments. The learning methods applied and compared including artificial neural network, support vector machine, C4.5, neuro-fuzzy, and ega-fuzzification. Compared with the theoretical one-dimensional model (simple lump element model), the results indicate that a learning method is an efficient way to estimate the piezoelectric transducer resonance frequency. The mega-fuzzification method is the best compared with other methods in this study.     

一种机械扫描式精密相移测长方法

以相移干涉测长为应用背景,提出了一种基于“机械扫描”的相移测长方法。利用超高弹性石英材料研制出了干涉测长所需的单体3路相移装置,并利用该相移装置建成了相移测长装置,成功地将位移传感器的量值在线溯源到光学频率标准,从而实现了对3路相移的准确测量。介绍了一种引入步长控制误差的“新五幅相移”实现相位解算方法,算法准确度达到0.01%。对不确定度的定量分析结果表明,基于该机械扫描式相移技术构建的绝对长度测量系统准确度可达0.5 nm。     

Three-dimensional hybrid model for predicting air-coupled generation of guided waves in composite material plates

For contact-less, non-destructive testing (NDT) purposes using air-coupled ultrasonic transducers, it is often required to numerically simulate the propagation of ultrasonic waves in solid media, and their coupling through air with specific transducers. At that point, one could simulate the propagation in the air and then in the solid component, using a Finite Element (FE) model. However, when three-dimensional (3D) modeling becomes necessary, such a solution reveals to be extremely demanding in terms of number of degrees of freedom and computational time. In this paper, to avoid such difficulties, the propagation in air from an ultrasonic transmitter to a tested solid plate is modeled in 3D using a closed-form solution. The knowledge of the transducer characteristics (diameter, frequency bandwidth, efficiency in Pa/V) allows the spatial distribution and actual pressure (in Pa) of the acoustic field produced in the air to be predicted, for a given input voltage. This pressure field is applied in turn as a boundary condition in a 3D FE model, to predict the plate response (displacement and stress guided beams) for a given distance between the transmitter and the plate, and for a given angle of orientation of the transmitter with respect to the plate. The FE model is so restricted to modeling of the solid structure only, thus reducing very significantly the number of degrees of freedom and computational time. The material constituting the plate is considered to be an anisotropic and viscoelastic medium. To validate the whole modeling process, an air-coupled ultrasonic transducer is used and oriented at a specific angle chosen for generating one specific Lamb mode guided along a composite plate sample, and a laser probe measures the normal velocity at different locations on the surface of the plate. In the field of NDT, it is generally suitable to excite a pure Lamb mode in order to ease the interpretation of received signals that would represent waves scattered by defects. After a validation step, the numerical model is then used to investigate the effect of the material anisotropy on the purity of the incident guided mode.     

Modelling and simulation of high-frequency (100 MHz) ultrasonic linear arrays based on single crystal LiNbO3

Background

High-frequency ultrasonic transducer arrays are essential for high resolution imaging in clinical analysis and Non-Destructive Evaluation (NDE). However, the fabrication of conventional backing-layer structure, which requires a pitch (distance between the centers of two adjacent elements) of half wavelength in medium, is really a great challenge.

Objective and method

Here we present an alternative buffer-layer structure with a silicon lens for volumetric imaging. The requirement for the size of the pitch is less critical for this structure, making it possible to fabricate high-frequency (100 MHz) ultrasonic linear array transducers. Using silicon substrate also makes it possible to integrate the arrays with IC (Integrated Circuit). To compare with the conventional backing-layer structure, a finite element tool, COMSOL, is employed to investigate the performances of acoustic beam focusing, the influence of pitch size for the buffer-layer configuration, and to calculate the electrical properties of the arrays, including crosstalk effect and electrical impedance.

Results

For a 100 MHz 10-element array of buffer-layer structure, the ultrasound beam in azimuth plane in water could be electronically focused to obtain a spatial resolution (a half-amplitude width) of 86 μm at the focal depth. When decreasing from half wavelength in silicon (42 μm) to half wavelength in water (7.5 μm), the pitch sizes weakly affect the focal resolution. The lateral spatial resolution is increased by 4.65% when the pitch size decreases from 42 μm to 7.5 μm. The crosstalk between adjacent elements at the central frequency is, respectively, −95 dB, −39.4 dB, and −60.5 dB for the 10-element buffer, 49-element buffer and 49-element backing arrays. Additionally, the electrical impedance magnitudes for each structure are, respectively, 4 kΩ, 26.4 kΩ, and 24.2 kΩ, which is consistent with calculation results using Krimholtz, Leedom, and Matthaei (KLM) model.

Conclusion

These results show that the buffer-layer configuration is a promising alternative for the fabrication of high-frequency ultrasonic linear arrays dedicated to volumetric imaging.     

Air-coupled MUMPs capacitive micromachined ultrasonic transducers with resonant cavities

This work reports performance improvements of air-coupled capacitive micromachined ultrasonic transducers (CMUTs) using resonant cavities. In order to perform this work, we have designed and manufactured a CMUT employing multi-user microelectromechanical systems (MEMS) processes (MUMPs). The transducer was designed using Helmholtz resonator principles. This was characterised by the dimensions of the cavity and several acoustic ports, which had the form of holes in the CMUT plate. The MUMPs process has the advantage of being low cost which allows the manufacture of economic prototypes. In this paper we show the effects of the resonant cavities and acoustic ports in CMUTs using laser Doppler vibrometry and acoustical measurements. We also use Finite Element (FE) simulations in order to support experimental measurements. The results show that it is possible to enhance the output pressure and bandwidth in air by tuning the resonance frequency of the plate (f_p) with that of the Helmholtz resonator (f_H). The experimental measurements show the plate resonance along with an additional resonance in the output pressure spectrum. This appears due to the effect of the new resonant cavities in the transducer. FE simulations show an increase of 11 dB in the output pressure with respect to that of a theoretical vacuum-sealed cavity MUMPs CMUT by properly tuning the transducer. The bandwidth has been also analyzed by calculating the mechanical Q factor of the tuned CMUT. This has been estimated as 4.5 compared with 7.75 for the vacuum-sealed cavity MUMPs CMUT.     

压电MEMS超声换能器研究进展

MEMS(micro-electromechanical systems)超声换能器(MEMS ultrasonic transducer,简称MUT)是采用微电子和微机械加工技术制作的新型超声换能器。与传统超声换能器相比,MUT具有体积小、重量轻、成本低、功耗低、可靠性高、频率控制灵活、频带宽、灵敏度高以及易于与电路集成和实现智能化等特点。是超声换能器的重要的研究方向之一。MUT的研究主要包括压电MUT(piezoelectric MUT,简称PMUT)和电容MUT(capacitiveMUT,简称CMUT)两个方面。本文概述了PMUT研究的发展进程和研究成果,展望了PMUT的研究和应用前景。     

液体表面张力的动态测量过程研究

本文介绍用测力传感器和计算机数据采集系统测量纯水表面张力的实验方法,测定了纯水的表面张力和表面张力与温度的初步关系曲线,研究了拉脱法测量的动态过程.     

用于电力系统的光学电流互感器技术进展

介绍了光学电流测量技术的发展情况，描述了目前几种主要的互感器结构及其基本原理，并对各自存在的问题及解决途径进行了讨论。从研究现状来看，块状玻璃型传感器技术相对成熟，已经有商业产品问世；混合型传感器测量精度较高，但传感头有源电路的供电技术复杂，还没有圆满的解决方案；全光纤型是光学电流互感器发展的最终目标，目前存在的主要问题是光纤的固有线性双折射难以处理，有赖于新型光纤材料及集成光学元件的进一步发展。最后综合评述了光学电流互感器技术的发展趋势及产业化前景。     

影响DAS精度的几种因素

在基于数据采集的DAS中，从设计角度出发，详细地分析了系统的传感器，预处理电路，噪声，采样频率和干扰系统精度的影响。     

Miniaturized back-side contact transducer for potentiometric sensors

A novel type of a miniature transducer for potentiometric sensors was designed and tested. The transducer is made from an ordinary printed circuit board using a typical technology. As a result, a back-side contact structure was obtained, which can be mounted in flow systems. The advantage of the fabrication process is its cheapness and flexibility in designing modified structures. The measurement properties of the transducer were tested as a chloride sensor. Then the structure was covered with polyHEMA and a potassium-selective membrane and tested as a potassium sensor. The performance and the long-term stability of the sensors with plasticized PVC and Siloprene based potassium-selective membranes were compared.