Monolithic piezoelectric transducers

Introduction to Piezoelectric Actuators and Transducers

Certain materials produce electric charges on their surfaces as a consequence of applying mechanical stress. The induced charges are proportional to the mechanical stress. This is called the direct piezoelectric effect and was discovered in quartz by Piere and Jacques Curie in 1880. Materials showing this phenomenon also conversely have a geometric strain proportional to an applied electric fie...

Piezoelectric Materials Used in Underwater Acoustic Transducers

High Temperature, High Power Piezoelectric Composite Transducers

Piezoelectric composites are a class of functional materials consisting of piezoelectric active materials and non-piezoelectric passive polymers, mechanically attached together to form different connectivities. These composites have several advantages compared to conventional piezoelectric ceramics and polymers, including improved electromechanical properties, mechanical flexibility and the abi...

Development of piezoelectric micromachined ultrasonic transducers

Piezoelectric micromachined ultrasonic transducers (pMUTs) are an example of the application of MEMS technology to ultrasound generation and detection, which is expected to offer many advantages over conventional transducers. In this work, we investigate pMUTs through novel design and fabrication methods. A finite element (FE) model, with original tools to measure device performance, was develo...

Absolute Ultrasonic Measurements with Piezoelectric Transducers

The absolute calibration of a piezoelectric transducer refers to the determination of the relationship between the electrical and acoustical quantities for a transducer coupled to a solid. It is shown how a well-characterized ultrasonic system, consisting of source,structure and receiver can be used to make such measurements for transducers operating as sources or receivers. Results are given, ...