Ultrasonic Propagation in a Dental Implant.

Ultrasound techniques can be used to characterize and stimulate dental implant osseointegration. However, the interaction between an ultrasonic wave and the implant-bone interface (IBI) remains unclear. This study-combining experimental and numerical approaches-investigates the propagation of an ultrasonic wave in a dental implant by assessing the amplitude of the displacements along the implant axis. An ultrasonic transducer was excited in a transient regime at 10 MHz. Laser interferometric techniques were employed to measure the amplitude of the displacements, which varied 3.2-8.9 nm along the implant axis. The results demonstrated the propagation of a guided wave mode along the implant axis. The velocity of the first arriving signal was equal to 2110 m.s-1, with frequency components lower than 1 MHz, in agreement with numerical results. Investigating guided wave propagation in dental implants should contribute to improved methods for the characterization and stimulation of the IBI.

Finite element simulation of the generation and detection by air-coupled transducers of guided waves in viscoelastic and anisotropic materials.

The measured characteristics (efficiency and sensitivity) of two air-coupled transducers allow for the prediction of the absolute values of the pressure of the bulk waves generated in air and for the measurement of the pressure of the field radiated in air by guided waves propagating in a structure. With finite element software, the pressure field generated by an air-coupled transducer is simulated by introducing a right-hand side member in the Helmholtz equation, which is used for computing the propagation from the transducer to a plate. The simulated source is rotated in order to impose an angle of incidence with respect to the normal of the plate and generate the corresponding guided mode. Inside the plate, the propagation is simulated with the dynamic equations of equilibrium and a complex stiffness tensor to take into account the viscoelastic anisotropy of the material. For modeling the three-dimensional fields of the guided modes propagating in a two-dimensional non-symmetry plane, a 2.5 dimensional model is introduced. The model computes the value of the pressure field radiated in air by the plates for any guided modes and can predict the detectability of the system for a known defect in a structure. A test bed incorporating two air-coupled transducers is used to generate and receive various guided modes. Two plates made of Perspex and carbon-epoxy composite are tested. The pressure measured by the receiver at various positions is compared to the results of the model to validate it.

Comparison of laser interferometry and radiation force method of measuring ultrasonic power.

The aim of this paper is to compare two different methods for the calculation of the ultrasonic output power of underwater transducers: the radiation force balance, which is the standard method, and the laser heterodyne interferometry, which is rather used to depict displacement or velocity distributions of the acoustic field. Here it is shown that the latter can also be used to calculate the acoustic time-average power with an uncertainty of about 22%, the radiation force balance giving an uncertainty of 12% (with 95% confidence). The interferometry experiments performed with two transducers working at 2.25 MHz and 8.25 MHz showed that they produce different acoustic fields (respectively Gaussian and Lorentz-sigmoidal distributions). Taking into account the acoustic field profiles, the acoustic time-average power from interferometry was calculated. It was found very similar to the time-average power measured with the radiation force balance in the plane-wave assumption.