CAREER: Adaptive Origami Structures for Acoustic Wave Guiding

引导声波的能力对于从癌症治疗到水下生态系统监测的广泛应用至关重要。声波引导技术广泛应用于医学和工程领域，如超声波、公共广播系统中的声音投影、水下生态系统监测和一些国防应用。最先进的方法使用固定位置的声学换能器和数字控制信号来管理它们的导波能力。这些方法往往不准确，因为它们在定位虚拟源或虚拟接收器时存在固有的模糊性。这限制了它们有效导波的能力。这个教师早期职业发展计划（Career）项目将通过创新地使用折纸科学来显著提高最先进的导波能力。该研究将研究可重构和自适应折纸式声学换能器，这种换能器可以实现简单而高效的导波。这些受折纸启发的传感器阵列的便携性将推动医疗保健、生态系统监测和国防方面的新应用。该项目将对声波导向知识库做出新的贡献。从小学到研究生，各个层次的学生都参与了这个项目。通过在一个综合研究教育项目中利用折纸结构的技术主题，这个职业项目将通过一个多方面的倡议，向学生群体介绍、沉浸和灌输声学原理，从而纠正学生对声学的兴趣。这个CAREER项目将建立分析和计算工具，以了解折纸启发的自适应声学结构如何改变导波实践。建模框架将通过无维空间傅里叶变换连接声学、几何和力学，以阐明线性/非线性导波现象，并与数字控制方法和理想的声辐射器/接收器形成鲜明对比。实验验证的框架将揭示无标度导波原理中细分几何形状、折叠程度和波长之间的相关性，而虚拟和物理传感器定位之间的对比将揭示数字波场控制方法缺陷的根源，并引导人们关注折纸启发和数字控制导波的主要组合。该框架的反转将使设计具有所需声波引导特性的细分阵列成为可能，并将广泛推进折叠结构的多物理场优化。该奖项反映了美国国家科学基金会的法定使命，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。

Ability to guide acoustic waves is central to a wide range of applications from cancer treatment to underwater ecosystem monitoring. Acoustic wave guiding techniques are widely used in medical and engineering applications such as ultrasound, sound projection used in public announcement systems, underwater ecosystem monitoring, and several defense applications. The state-of-the-art methods use fixed locations of acoustic transducers and digitally controlled signals to manage their wave guiding ability. These methods often tend to be inaccurate as they suffer from inherent ambiguity in locating virtual source or receiver. This limits their ability to do effective wave guiding. This Faculty Early Career Development Program (CAREER) project will significantly enhance the state-of-the-art in wave guiding capability by innovative use of origami science. The research will investigate reconfigurable and adaptive origami-inspired acoustic transducers that can achieve simple yet highly effective wave guiding. The portability of these origami-inspired transducer arrays will propel new applications in health care, ecosystem monitoring, and defense. This project will make new contributions to the knowledge base in acoustic wave guiding. The project also has significant involvement of students at all levels from elementary to graduate. By harnessing the technical themes of folding origami structures in an integrated research-education program, this CAREER project will redress waning student exposures and interest in acoustics by a multi-faceted initiative that will introduce, immerse, and instill acoustic principles for student groups at many levels.This CAREER project will establish analytical and computational tools to yield understanding on how origami-inspired, adaptive acoustic structures may transform wave guiding practices. The modeling framework will bridge acoustics, geometry, and mechanics via non-dimensional, spatial Fourier transforms to illuminate linear/nonlinear wave guiding phenomena and enable clear contrast with digital control methods and ideal acoustic radiators/receivers. The experimentally validated framework will reveal correlations among tessellation geometry, folding extent, and wavelength for scale-free wave guiding principles, while contrast between virtual and physical transducer positioning will expose origins of deficiencies in digital wave field control methods and guide attention to prime combinations of origami-inspired and digitally controlled wave guiding. A reversal of the framework will enable the design tessellated arrays for desired acoustic wave guiding properties, and will broadly advance multiphysics optimization of folding structures.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.