Book review: Fundamentals of Physical Acoustics D.T. Blackstock; Wiley & Sons Ltd, New York, 2000, 541 pages, ISBN 0-471-3197This book is an excellent piece of work. The text is extremely clear and goes a long way towards meeting the declared pedagogical target. The author has written a comprehensive text. The proportions of equations and explanations/interpretations are particularly well balanced. Throughout the book, the context and the validity domain for any equation derived are clearly stated. No doubt this book will be of invaluable help for students, academics and engineers. The structure of the book has a peculiar recursive pattern. Several topics are treated in each chapter, but these topics are the main subjects themselves of subsequent chapters (which can sometimes be found after several intermediate chapters).Althoughthismeans that the author returns to a subject more than once, no impression of redundancy comes out from the reading. This is due to a careful choice of the examples and the different angles from which the problems are viewed. The way in which the book is structured has a beneficial effect and undoubtedly participates in enhancing the pedagogical content. Essentially, each subject is treated in detail several times, thus giving the readerthe opportunity to assimilate the concepts while still progressing in their discovery. Moreover the presentation and the layout of the book are excellent
The crevice model for heterogeneous nucleation of bubbles in water in response to a decreasing liquid pressure is studied. The model neglects gas-diffusion effects and is therefore more suited for acoustic than for flow cavitation. It is argued that previous work has overlooked the essential requirement of unstable growth of the interface in the crevice. As a consequence, the available results are incorrect in some cases. Another feature of the model which is considered is the process by which the interface moves out of the crevice. It is concluded that, depending on circumstances, the conditions for this step may be more stringent than those for the initial expansion of the nucleus inside the crevice. Some numerical examples are given to illustrate the complex behavior of nuclei, depending of geometrical parameters, gas saturation, contact angles, and other quantities.
To address the question of the role of nonlinear effects in the propagation of noise radiated by high-power jet aircraft, extensive measurements were made of the F-22A Raptor during static engine run-ups. Data were acquired at low-, intermediate-, and high-thrust engine settings with microphones located 23-305 m from the aircraft along several angles. Comparisons between the results of a generalized-Burgers-equation-based nonlinear propagation model and the measurements yield favorable agreement, whereas application of a linear propagation model results in spectral predictions that are much too low at high frequencies. The results and analysis show that significant nonlinear propagation effects occur for even intermediate-thrust engine conditions and at angles well away from the peak radiation angle. This suggests that these effects are likely to be common in the propagation of noise radiated by high-power aircraft.
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