Band-Gap Engineering of Elastic Waveguides Using Periodic Materials

Abstract

Within periodically heterogeneous materials, wave scattering takes place across constituent material interfaces in such a way that an overall wave attenuation effect arises at certain frequency ranges known as band gaps. This phenomenon can be utilized in developing structures with tailored dynamic characteristics. In this work, periodic materials are used to synthesize elastic waveguides within bounded structures. The underlying local-global design process is described, and the effect of the number of periodic cells used to form the guide “wall” is studied. Using forced vibration analysis, it is shown that with only three or four periodic unit cells, the desired wave attenuation capacity required to form a guide is attained.