Driven by new demands from industry, the field of acoustic imaging is rapidly evolving new approaches to meet the demands. The current trend toward micro and nano-technology has been pushing the operating frequency of scanning acoustic microscopes (SAM), from MHz to GHz. To become a useful tool for nondestructive evaluation (NDE), the SAM must give high resolution and also maintain reasonable depth of field below the sample surface, while overcoming the effects of surface roughness. A recent trend of needs for the SAM is to enhance resolution for detecting defects (e.g., microcracks, inclusions, debondings, delaminations), and develop a capability and an accuracy for obtaining quantitative data (e.g., velocities of waves, attenuation) for measuring residual stress, anisotropy, thickness of thin films, or the like. Furthermore, the SAM is to be modified to use in various environments. In this paper, a principle and some applications for both a practical shear wave lens and a noncontact lens will be summarized. [S0094-9930(00)02503-8]

Issue Section:
Technical Papers
Keywords:
nondestructive testing, acoustic microscopy, acoustic imaging, lenses, materials testing, composite materials, plastics, ceramics
Topics:
Acoustics, Lenses (Optics), Nondestructive evaluation, Resolution (Optics), Shear waves, Microscopy, Transducers
1.
Lemons
,
R. A.
, and
Quate
,
C. F.
,
1974
, “
Acoustic Microscope-Scanning Version
,”
Appl. Phys. Lett.
,
24
, pp.
163
–
165
.
2.
Kino, G. S., 1980, “Fundamentals of Scanning Systems,” Scanned Image Microscopy, ed., E. A. Ash, Academic Press, London, UK, pp. 1–21.
3.
Jipson
,
V. B.
, and
Quate
,
C. F.
,
1978
, “
Acoustic Microscopy at Optical Wavelength
,”
Appl. Phys. Lett.
,
32
, pp.
789
–
791
.
4.
Hadimioglu
,
B.
, and
Quate
,
C. F.
,
1983
, “
Water Acoustic Microscopy at Suboptical Waterlengths
,”
Appl. Phys. Lett.
,
43
, pp.
1006
–
1007
.
5.
Heiserman
,
J.
,
Rugar
,
D.
, and
Quate
,
C. F.
,
1980
, “
Cryogenic Acoustic Microscopy
,”
J. Acoust. Soc. Am.
,
67
, pp.
1629
–
1637
.
6.
Foster
,
J. S.
, and
Rugar
,
D.
,
1983
, “
High Resolution Acoustic Microscopy in Superfluid Helium
,”
Appl. Phys. Lett.
,
42
, pp.
869
–
871
.
7.
Khuri-Yakub, B. T., and Chou, C.-H., 1986, “Acoustic Microscope Lenses With Shear Wave Transducers,” IEEE 1986 Ultrasonic Symposium, pp. 741–744, IEEE, New York, NY.
8.
Davids
,
D. A.
,
We
,
P. Y.
, and
Chizhik
,
D.
,
1989
, “
Restricted Aperture Acoustic Microscope Lens for Rayleigh Wave Imaging
,”
Appl. Phys. Lett.
,
54
, No.
17
, pp.
1639
–
1641
.
9.
Atalar, A., Koymen, H., and Degertekin, L., 1990, “Characterization of Layered Materials by the Lamb Wave Lens,” Proc., IEEE 1990 Ultrasonics Symposium, pp. 359–362.
10.
Atalar, A., Ishikawa, I., Ogura, Y., and Tomita, K., 1993, “Anisotropy Sensitivity of an Acoustic Lens With Slit Aperture,” Proc., IEEE 1993 Ultrasonics Symposium, pp. 613–616.
11.
Hutchins, D. A., and Schindel, D. W., 1994, “Advances in Non-Contact and Air-Coupled Transducer,” Proc., IEEE 1994 Ultrasonics Symposium, pp. 1245–1254.
12.
Miyasaka
,
C.
,
Tittmann
,
B. R.
, and
Ohno
,
M.
,
1999
, “
Practical Shear Wave Lens Design for Improved Resolution With Acoustic Microscope
,”
Res. Nondestruct. Eval.
,
11
, pp.
97
–
116
.
13.
Jin
,
X. J.
,
Ladebaum
,
I.
, and
Khuri-Yakub
,
B. T.
,
1998
, “
The Fabrication of Capacitative Ultrasonic Transducers
,”
J. Microelectromech. Syst.
,
7
, pp.
295
–
302
.
14.
Schindel
,
W.
, and
Hutchins
,
D. A.
,
1995
, “
Applications of Micromachined Capacitance Transducers in Air-Coupled Ultrasonics and Non-Destructive Evaluation
,”
IEEE Trans. Ultrason. Ferroelectr. Freq. Control
,
42
, No.
1
, pp.
51
–
58
.
15.
Bhardwaj, M. C., Neeson, I., Langron, M. E., and Vandervalk, L., 2000, “Contact-Free Ultrasound: The Final Frontier in Non-Destructive Materials Characterization,” presented at 24th Conference: An International Conference on Engineering Ceramics & Structures, American Ceramic.
16.
Sandman, J. S., and Tittmann, B. R., 2000, “Development of an Air-Coupled Ultrasonic Sensor for High Pressure, and Temperature Applications,” presented at SPIE’s International Symposium on Nondestructive Evaluation Techniques for Aging Infrastructure & Manufacturing.
Copyright © 2000
 by ASME
You do not currently have access to this content.