I-Corps: Wavenumber Spiral Frequency-Steerable Acoustic Transducer for Structural Health Monitoring

I-Corps：用于结构健康监测的波数螺旋频率可控声学传感器

• 批准号: 1736060
• 负责人: Massimo Ruzzene
• 金额: $ 5万
• 依托单位: Georgia Tech Research Corporation
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 项目类别: Standard Grant
• 财政年份: 2017
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2017-03-15 至 2018-02-28
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=1736060&HistoricalAwards=false
• 关键词: Corps; Wavenumber; Spiral; Frequency; Steerable

The broader impact/commercial potential of this I-Corps project is related to reductions in inspection and maintenance costs of commercial and military aircraft. As the average age of existing aircraft is extending beyond the design life, fatigue cracks are a major issue that requires close monitoring to ensure continued airworthiness. Extensive and time consuming manual non-destructive inspection programs have been implemented to monitor and insure the safety and structural integrity of the aircraft. The Wavenumber Spiral Frequency-Steerable Acoustic Transducer (WS-FSAT) is a Structural Health Monitoring (SHM) sensor that enables inspection of in hard-to-reach areas within an aircraft or other asset, where significant structural risk is present, and promises to enable remote inspection of critical structures without disassembly. The technology has the advantage of inherent directional sensing capabilities over relatively wide areas, which translates to lower size, weight and installation costs. Potential benefits include the reduction of the time and cost of inspections, and of the associated aircraft downtime, and of structural integrity risks through more frequent monitoring of structural risk areas. The proposed I-Corp program explores implementation and commercialization opportunities of the technology within the aerospace industry and its broader applicability for inspection and monitoring of structural components.This I-Corps project explores application and market opportunities for the Wavenumber Spiral Frequency-Steerable Acoustic Transducer (WS-FSAT). The WS-FSAT is a novel ultrasonic transducer that enables in-situ, nondestructive inspection of aircraft structures to detect defects that impact structural integrity and safety. WS-FSATs have inherent directional capabilities with the ability to detect, locate and characterize structural defects with significantly lower hardware and signal processing complexity than other approaches. The WS-FSAT maps the direction of wave sensing to a specific frequency component in the spectrum of the received signal, which greatly facilitates the identification and localization of damage. These directional capabilities rely on the design of the electrodes on a sensing substrate that performs the transduction of mechanical strains associated with waves propagating in the structure to an electrical signal. Such design process is at the core of the technology, and is suitable to meet the needs of inspection of complex structural components.

I-Corps项目的更广泛影响/商业潜力与降低商用和军用飞机的检查和维护成本有关。由于现有飞机的平均机龄超过了设计寿命，疲劳裂纹是一个主要问题，需要密切监测，以确保持续适航。广泛和耗时的人工无损检测程序已经实施，以监测和确保飞机的安全性和结构完整性。波数螺旋频率可控声学传感器（WS-FSAT）是一种结构健康监测（SHM）传感器，可对飞机或其他资产内存在重大结构风险的难以到达的区域进行检查，并有望在不拆卸的情况下对关键结构进行远程检查。该技术具有在相对较宽的区域内固有的方向感测能力的优势，这意味着更低的尺寸，重量和安装成本。潜在的好处包括减少检查的时间和成本，减少相关的飞机停机时间，并通过更频繁地监测结构风险区域来减少结构完整性风险。I-Corps项目旨在探索该技术在航空航天工业中的应用和商业化机会，以及其在结构部件检测和监测方面的更广泛应用。该I-Corps项目旨在探索波数螺旋频率可控声学传感器（WS-FSAT）的应用和市场机会。WS-FSAT是一种新型的超声换能器，能够对飞机结构进行原位无损检测，以检测影响结构完整性和安全性的缺陷。WS-FSAT具有固有的定向能力，能够检测、定位和表征结构缺陷，与其他方法相比，其硬件和信号处理复杂度显著降低。WS-FSAT将波感测的方向映射到接收信号频谱中的特定频率分量，这极大地促进了损伤的识别和定位。这些定向能力依赖于感测衬底上的电极的设计，所述感测衬底执行与在结构中传播的波相关联的机械应变到电信号的转换。这种设计过程是该技术的核心，适合于复杂结构部件的检测需求。