Contact-Free Actuation Enabled by Acoustic Metasurfaces

该补助金将资助对声波物体的远程和非接触式驱动的基础研究。物体的运动控制和操纵在科学和工程中提出了普遍的挑战。传统的致动机构通常需要物理系绳或机载能量源，这在机器人、材料组装、生物工程和生物医学的实际应用中可能是麻烦的。通过波（例如声波）的辐射压力的致动可以是完全无接触的，但是当前技术限于小的亚波长对象。为了克服这些限制，该项目将利用声波与被称为超表面的工程结构的相互作用。其主要思想是用表面图案包裹物体，这些表面图案被故意设计成控制致动波的动量变化，即控制致动的方向和强度，从而能够远程移动、操纵和操纵这些物体。科学研究将与教育和推广活动紧密结合，包括旨在扩大参与并让学生接触超材料和机器人交叉点的科学和工程的动手演示。该项目的技术目标是发展对超表面控制非接触动力学的基本理解。通过利用超颖表面图案，可以在沿物体表面的沿着每个位置处以高保真度和高分辨率控制辐射压力。本研究的目的是开发一个双向的，正向和反向的模型，所需的对象动态和元表面模式之间的映射。通过结合波物理分析和有限元模拟，该项目将确定新的元表面拓扑结构，适合作为非接触式驱动的构建块。建模工作将得到超颖表面结构的制造和表征以及桌面实验的支持，以证明其动态行为。该奖项反映了NSF的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的知识价值和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

This grant will fund fundamental research on the remote and contactless actuation of objects with acoustic waves. Motion control and manipulation of objects present universal challenges in science and engineering. Conventional actuation mechanisms often require physical tethers or onboard energy sources, which can be cumbersome in practical applications in robotics, materials assembly, bioengineering, and biomedicine. Actuation by the radiation pressure of waves, such as acoustic waves, can be entirely contactless, but current techniques are limited to small, subwavelength objects. To overcome these limitations, this project will exploit the interaction of acoustic waves with engineered structures known as metasurfaces. The main idea is to envelop objects with surface patterns that are deliberately designed to control the momentum change of the actuating wave, that is, to control the direction and intensity of actuation, enabling to remotely move, steer, and manipulate these objects. The scientific research will be tightly integrated with education and outreach activities including hands-on demonstrations designed to broaden participation and expose students to science and engineering at the intersection of metamaterials and robotics.The technical objective of this project is to develop a foundational understanding of metasurface-controlled contactless dynamics. By utilizing metasurface patterns, it is possible to control the radiation pressure with high fidelity and high resolution at each location along the object’s surface. The objective of this research is to develop a bidirectional, forward and inverse, models that map between the desired object dynamics and metasurface patterns. By combining wave-physics analysis and finite-element simulations, this project will identify new metasurface topologies that are suitable as building blocks for contactless actuation. Modeling efforts will be supported by the fabrication and characterization of metasurface structures and tabletop experiments to demonstrate their dynamical behavior.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.