Polyhedral directional transducer array
First Claim
1. A transducer array comprising:
- a plurality of acoustic transducers for use in a fluid medium, each of said transducers having maximum lateral dimensions less than one acoustic wavelength in said medium;
arraying means for arraying said acoustic transducers at the vertices of a regular polyhedron defining vertices and more than six sides; and
wherein said arraying means further comprises;
one of drive and receiving means for generating transducer drive signals and for receiving transduced signals therefrom, respectively; and
delay control means coupled with said acoustic transducers and with said one of said drive means and said receiving means, for controlling an acoustic beam formed by said array.
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Accused Products
Abstract
Each of the acoustic transducers (elements) of an array has a maximum dimension of less than λ. They are located at the vertices of a regular polyhedron, which may be an icosahedron (12 elements), or a dodecahedron (20 elements). This placement effectively locates the elements on the surface of a sphere with diameter selected to provide an interelement spacing of λ/3 to 2λ/3. The signals are delayed for phasing to form directive "beams." A second array includes elements located at the vertices of a smaller polyhedron centered at the same point and included within the first array, and operated at a higher frequency than the outermost array. In order to reduce the effects of shadowing, the locations of the transducers of the smaller included array are selected to lie on radials passing through the centroids of the faces of the polygon defining the larger array.
43 Citations
9 Claims
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1. A transducer array comprising:
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a plurality of acoustic transducers for use in a fluid medium, each of said transducers having maximum lateral dimensions less than one acoustic wavelength in said medium; arraying means for arraying said acoustic transducers at the vertices of a regular polyhedron defining vertices and more than six sides; and
wherein said arraying means further comprises;one of drive and receiving means for generating transducer drive signals and for receiving transduced signals therefrom, respectively; and delay control means coupled with said acoustic transducers and with said one of said drive means and said receiving means, for controlling an acoustic beam formed by said array. - View Dependent Claims (2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9)
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Specification