Anomalous behavior in the radiation pattern of piezoelectric transducers induced by parasitic Lamb wave generation

Abstract

In order to improve ultrasonic image quality, transducers, similar to those currently used in nondestructive testing and medical imaging applications, have been studied extensively. Attention has been given to single isolated transducers, for which anomalous radiation patterns have been obtained, and to transducers integrated in an array structure, where additional problems occur due to coupling effects between nearest neighbors. An experimental study of these phenomena has made it possible in both cases to find the origin of the perturbations with respect to the theoretical situations which occur in the radiation pattern. Solutions for increasing these perturbations are also suggested.