Associate Professor  Ning  Chen
the School of Mechanical and Vehicle Engineering, Hunan University,  China

Title: The design and uncertainty analysis of pneumatic soft acoustic metamaterials

Abstract:

Tunable acoustic metamaterials have excellent sound waves control and manipulation properties because of their deformations under different stimuli. Pneumatic actuation has recently attracted the attention due to its low-cost, fast in response and easy to integrate. Recently, we designed several pneumatic soft acoustic metamaterials to realize tunable band gap. The designed pneumatic soft acoustic metamaterial comprises an array of soft inflatable rubber cavity in background air. And the scatterer in the soft acoustic metamaterials can deform by adjusting the air pressure, which can switch on or off the band gaps. The effects of scatterer geometry, shapes and orientations on the adjustable band gap are studied using numerical simulation methods. Furthermore, we fabricate a modularized pneumatic soft acoustic metamaterial and its tunable band gap has been experimentally demonstrated. Considering the ubiquitous uncertainty factor, we further investigate the influence of uncertainty on pneumatic soft acoustic metamaterial system. We conduct research on the pneumatic soft acoustic metamaterial system, including uncertainty characterization analysis, uncertainty propagation analysis and uncertainty optimization design. We also experimental demonstrated the effectiveness of the uncertainty analysis on the deformation and acoustic property of the pneumatic soft acoustic metamaterial system. Our study provides a guide to design and fabricate a pneumatic soft acoustic metamaterial, and confirms the feasibility and application potential of the design of acoustic devices by harnessing pneumatic actuation. The uncertainty analysis for pneumatic soft acoustic metamaterials systems can promote their application in industrial sectors.

Biography:

Ning Chen is an associate professor in the School of Mechanical and Vehicle Engineering, Hunan University. His research interest includes uncertain numerical analysis and optimization of structural acoustic system, and soft acoustic metamaterial etc.. He has published more than 50 papers in related fields. He chaired many projects like the National Natural Science Foundation of China.