In this letter, a class of honeycomb acoustic metamaterial possessing lightweight and yet sound-proof properties is designed, theoretically proven, and then experimentally verified. It is here reported that the proposed metamaterial having a remarkably small mass per unit area at 1.3 kg/m2 can achieve low frequency (<500 Hz) sound transmission loss (STL) consistently greater than 45 dB. Furthermore, the sandwich panel which incorporates the honeycomb metamaterial as the core material yields a STL that is consistently greater than 50 dB at low frequencies. The proposed metamaterial is promising for constructing structures that are simultaneously strong, lightweight, and sound-proof.
Over the past decade there has been a great amount of research effort devoted to the topic of acoustic metamaterials (AMMs). The recent development of AMMs has enlightened the way of manipulating sound waves. Several potential applications such as low-frequency noise reduction, cloaking, angular filtering, subwavelength imaging, and energy tunneling have been proposed and implemented by the so-called membrane- or plate-type AMMs. This paper aims to offer a thorough overview on the recent development of membrane- or plate-type AMMs. The underlying mechanism of these types of AMMs for tuning the effective density will be examined first. Four different groups of membrane- or plate-type AMMs (membranes with masses attached, plates with masses attached, membranes or plates without masses attached, and active AMMs) will be reviewed. The opportunities, limitations, and challenges of membrane- or plate-type AMMs will be also discussed.
The effective densities of plate- and membrane-type acoustic metamaterials (AMMs) without mass attached are studied theoretically and numerically. Three models, including the analytic model (based on the plate flexural wave equation and the membrane wave equation), approximate model (under the low frequency approximation), and the finite element method (FEM) model, are first used to calculate the acoustic impedance of square and clamped plates or membranes. The effective density is then obtained using the resulting acoustic impedance and a lumped model. Pressure transmission coefficients of the AMMs are computed using the obtained densities. The effect of the loss from the plate is also taken into account. Results from different models are compared and good agreement is found, particularly between the analytic model and the FEM model. The approximate model is less accurate when the frequency of interest is above the first resonance frequency of the plate or membrane. The approximate model, however, provides simple formulae to predict the effective densities of plate- or membrane-type AMMs and is accurate for the negative density frequency region. The methods presented in this paper are useful in designing AMMs for manipulating acoustic waves.
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