Continuous Piezoelectric Health Monitoring Systems Based on Ultrasonic Guided Waves

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This proposal will be awarded using funds made available by the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 (Public Law 111-5), and meets the requirements established in Section 2 of the White House Memorandum entitled, Ensuring Responsible Spending of Recovery Act Funds, dated March 20, 2009. I also affirm, as the cognizant Program Officer, that the proposal does not support projects described in Section 1604 of Division A of the Recovery Act. Continuous comb transducer strips will generate ultrasonic guided waves for structural health monitoring (SHM) of plate and shell structures. A theoretically driven approach, based on the application of wave mechanics principles, will be used to research and design a network of strip sensors. Fibrous piezoelectric composites will be considered for the comb elements, widely expanding the design space of these elements to include fiber orientation and volume fraction in addition to size, configuration, and location/size of the electrodes. Piezoelectric and mechanical material properties for these innovative sensor designs will be researched. The system will be capable of active interrogation with Lamb waves upon demand, as well as passive monitoring of acoustic emissions with low power. Project progress and results will be shared with the Center of Excellence in Structural Health Monitoring. The center bridges academia, government, and industry and aims to advance the state of the art in SHM and transfer technology. The investigators will outreach to middle school and high school students, especially targeting young women and underrepresented groups. The graduate students will have the opportunity to work with the Air Force Research Laboratory and a small business entity.