Sensors and Actuators A 296 (2019) 52–60

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Sensors and Actuators A: Physical

journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/sna

Design, fabrication and characterization of Emfi-based ferroelectret

air-coupled ultrasonic transducer
Jianying Tang a , Likun Tong a , Yanxun Xiang a,∗ , Xunlin Qiu b , Mingxi Deng c,∗ ,
Fuzhen Xuan a
a
Key Laboratory of Pressure Systems and Safety of MOE, School of Mechanical and Power Engineering, East China University of Science and Technology,
Shanghai, 200237, China
b
Institute for Print and Media Technology, Chemnitz University of Technology, Reichenhainer Str. 70, 09126, Chemnitz, Germany
c
College of Aerospace Engineering, Chongqing University, Chongqing, 400044, China

a r t i c l e i n f o a b s t r a c t

Article history: Air-coupled ultrasonic testing (ACUT) has many advantages over other non-destructive testing (NDT)
Received 8 March 2019 methods, among which the most outstanding one is completely no contamination of the sample. There-
Received in revised form 30 May 2019 fore, it can be applied in various conditions where liquid coupling media is not suitable. With the
Accepted 23 June 2019
development of ACUT, it is found that mismatch between air and solid is one of the biggest difficul-
Available online 5 July 2019
ties confronting researchers, and electromechanical film (EMFi) with low acoustic impedance can be a
promising solution when used as vibration element in air-coupled ultrasonic transducers. In this contri-
Keywords:
bution, one planar and two spherically focused EMFi-based transducers were designed, fabricated, and
Air-coupled ultrasonic transducer
Electromechanical film
their properties were characterized through frequency response test as well as focal length test. Then
Imaging scan imaging experiments of PMMA samples were performed to demonstrate the possibility and feasibility of
EMFi transducers in non-contact testing.
© 2019 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

1. Introduction surface and environmental conditions [3,7], it inevitably has disad-

In manufacturing industry, ultrasonic testing is one of the most
widely applied and the fastest developing non-destructive testing
(NDT) methods. Traditional ultrasonic testing requires the use of
coupling media, such as water and gel, in order to minimize the loss
of ultrasonic energy and to achieve better performance of trans-
ducers. However, no liquid couplant is allowed in some conditions,
like the detection of porous materials, polymer materials such as
carbon-fiber-reinforced polymers (CFRP) and materials with sen-
sitive surfaces conditions [1–5]. Therefore, air-coupled ultrasonic
testing (ACUT) with air as its coupling medium has attracted more
and more attention due to such advantages as ease of use, entirely
no destruction and contamination of the components under test
[6]. Although ACUT has many advantages over other testing meth-
ods, for example, it can achieve not only stable and continuous
coupling effect, but also automated detection using appropriate fix-
tures and test platforms without additional treatment for material
∗ Corresponding authors.
E-mail addresses: tammytjy@sina.com (J. Tang), lik tong@foxmail.com
(L. Tong), yxxiang@ecust.edu.cn (Y. Xiang), xunlin.qiu@mb.tu-chemnitz.de (X. Qiu),
dengmx65@yahoo.com (M. Deng), fzxuan@ecust.edu.cn (F. Xuan).
vantages, among which enormous acoustic impedance mismatch
between air and solid is the most common one, namely the ultra-
sonic energy losses at air-transducer and air-specimen interfaces.
This may result in tremendous attenuation of the ultrasonic signal
energy between transmitter and receiver [7,8].
For commercially available air-coupled transducers, this prob-
lem is typically solved by adding one or several matching layers
in the front of the piezoelectric material. Lead zirconate titanate
(PZT) and polyvinylidene fluoride (PVDF) are the two most widely
employed materials for vibration elements in air-coupled ultra-
sonic transducers, for which researchers have developed many
effective matching layers to reduce the detrimental effects of mis-
match between air and solid [8]. But materials for the matching
layers are limited and also need to be carefully selected according to
the specific piezoelectric material. In addition, accurate calculation
is also required, because the layer thickness and the bonding condi-
tions not only have a huge impact on the ultrasonic signals, but also
complicate the manufacturing process. Furthermore, the reduction
of bandwidth is also a problem for the application of matching lay-
ers [7–10]. Capacitive transducers composed of thin polymer film
and micromachined backplate, which are also called CMUT (Capac-
itive Micromachined Ultrasnonic Transducer), are then developed
to resolve the problems of matching layers in air-coupled ultra-

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.sna.2019.06.044
0924-4247/© 2019 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.
 J. Tang et al. / Sensors and Actuators A 296 (2019) 52–60
Fig. 1. SEM of the cross section of a cellular PP sample.
sonic transducers. The first CMUT was presented by Suzuki et al [11]
in1989. With the development of MEMS (Micro-electromechanical
Systems), other progress has been made. Song et al [12,13] have
developed focused capacitive air-coupled transducer based on flex-
ible backplate. Hutchins and colleagues have devoted much of
their efforts to enhancing the performance of capacitive trans-
ducers for surface imaging, and achieved in some of their works
an extraordinary resolution as small as 5 ␮m [14–16]. However,
capacitive air-coupled transducers need precautionary measures
to avoid contamination between film and backplate. Besides, a bias
voltage is also required in the operation. In order to overcome
the above-mentioned problems and to broaden the application of
ACUT, Horsely and colleagues have studied PMUT (Piezoelectric
Micromachined Ultrasonic Transducer) [17,18], which requires no
bias voltage. PMUTs are made of piezoelectric films and their back-
ing material (generally silicon based) and several AIN-film PMUTs
combined with CMOS (Complementary Metal-Oxide- Semiconduc-
tor) have been reported.
Today, the development of new piezoelectric materials has also
become a feasible solution. One of the promising alternatives is to
use ferroelectric-like electret film, which is also called electrome-
chanical film (EMFi) or ferroelectret. Cellular polypropylene (cPP) is
one of the well-established representatives of ferroelectret materi-
als [19–21]. It has high resistivity and can be permanently charged
through dielectric barrier discharges (DBDs) in high electric field
[22]. Bovtun, V., Gaal, M. and their groups have made an attempt
to explore the possibility of EMFi transducers [6,10,23–26]. In this
paper, we would develop, fabricate and characterize planar and
spherical focused air-coupled ultrasonic transducers based on cPP
ferroelectret. The performance of the developed transducers under
different experimental conditions has been studied from the fol-
lowing three aspects:
(1) The frequency response experiments of different transducers
using laser vibrometer and ultrasound system.
(2) The measured focal length of spherical focusing transducers.
(3) Surface defect imaging of a series of holes on PMMA samples
with single-sided accessibility.
2. Materials and transducer fabrication
Cellular polypropylene is one of the representatives of ferro-
electrets. There are numerous internal air cavities with lateral
dimension ranging from10 to 100 ␮m and vertical dimension rang-
ing from 1 to 5 ␮m [27]. The SEM of a cellular PP sample is shown
in Fig. 1. The nonhomogeneously-distributed air cavities, acting
as macroscopic dipoles, were created by stretching filler-loaded
polymer and further optimized via gas-diffusion expansion (GDE)
process [28]. They are particularly sensitive to forces perpendicular
to the film surface [29]. EMFi is characterized by its strong piezo-
electric response, flexibility, low density and acoustic impedance.
Its high potential for air-coupled ultrasonic application can be
53
demonstrated by comparison with other piezoelectric materials in
Table1 [26].
The general properties of EMFi are listed as followings:
(1) Low acoustic impedance
Low density of EMFi results in low acoustic impedance com-
pared with PZT and PVDF. It’s closer to the impedance of air (about
0.0004MRayl), thus better matching air without using additional
matching layers.
(2) High piezoelectric sensitivity
The d33 value of EMFi used in this paper is around
200–205 pC/N, which is an order of magnitude higher than that
of PVDF. The piezoelectric performance is even better, and it is the
basis of fabricating piezoelectric transducers. In addition, research
has proved that the d33 value can be even higher after a double-
expansion process which results from the reduction of elasticity
modulus [30].
(3) High flexibility
Even when the EMFi is attached to a curved substrate, the
vibration mode is not affected by the curvature of the substrate.
Therefore, EMFi is suitable to make focused air-coupled ultra-
sonic transducers, which would have higher emitted or received
ultrasonic energy. Unlike piezoceramic transducers, EMFi films are
lightweight and can be utilized as pressure sensor even in the case
of tiny and lightweight carrier objects [21].
(4) Wide Bandwidth
The extremely low acoustic impedance of EMFi results in a large
bandwidth [21]. The experimental results in this paper (3.1–3.2)
regarding bandwidth of EMFi transducers also demonstrated their
wide bandwidth characteristics.
It has been found that EMFi can work in the performance of
ideal piston-like sound source. Dielectric and electromechanical
properties of the cellular polypropylene ferroelectret films (EMFi),
combining strong piezoelectric response with a low density and
softness, evidence their high potential for air-coupled ultrasonic
applications. [31]
The EMFi used here were prepared from five-layer co-extruded
PP films (Trade name VHD40, Treofan GmbH, Germany) with an
original overall thickness of 40 ␮m and density of 620 kg/m3 [28].
In order to optimize their electromechanical properties, the films
were inflated in nitrogen environment with a subsequent heat
treatment for stabilization [28]. In order to render the films piezo-
electric, the cavities must be internally charged through DBDs
under high electric filed. Air inside the cavities breaks down in DBD
charging, and charges of opposite polarity are generated, which are
finally trapped at the internal top and bottom surfaces of the cav-
ities. Thus, the charged cavities can be considered as man-made
macroscopic dipoles. Unlike other ferroelectric materials, ferro-
electrets do not exhibit curie phase transition [32]. Charging of
ferroelectrets can be done by corona or direct contact charging
[22]. With corona, a surface potential is built up which triggers
DBDs in the cavities. Usually, ferroelectrets are charged at room
temperature, although it is reported that charging at elevated tem-
perature is useful for enhancing the charging efficiency [33] and
the thermal stability of the piezoelectricity [34]. Here, the inflated
films were corona charged for 1 min at room temperature with a tip
voltage of 20 kV. The charged samples were then metalized on both
surfaces with aluminum electrodes 50 nm in thickness. Because of
the special cellular structure of the charged cavity in the film, the
54 J. Tang et al. / Sensors and Actuators A 296 (2019) 52–60

Table 1
Properties of piezoelectric materials in comparison.

Material EMFi (cPP) Ceramics PZT [26] PVDF [26]

Quasi-static piezoelectric coefficient d33 [pC/N] 200–205 70–600 20–25

Thickness d [␮m] 55–60 / /
Dielectric permittivity εT33 [10 kHz] 1.12–1.23 [26] 150–3500 12
Density ␳ [kg/m3] 413–451* 4000–8000 1780
Sound velocity v [m/s] 5̃4** 4000–6000 2200
Acoustic impedance Z [MRayl] 0̃.023*** 25–37 3.9
 ×d
*
Calculated by  = 0 d 0 , ␳0 -initial density of EMFi(VHD40, Treofan GmbH, Germany); d0 -initial thickness of EMFi.
**
Calculated from the following frequency response experiments.
***
Calculated from.Z =  × v.

Table 2
Parameters of different types of EMFi.

Large Medium Small

No.
L1 L2 M1 M2 S1 S2

Diameter(EMFi)/mm 100 100 30 30 25 25

Diameter(Electrodes)/mm 100 100 25 25 20 20
d33/(pC/N) 205 205 205 230 200 205
thickness/␮m 55 55 60 60 60 60

Table 3
Aperture and film piezoelectric coefficient of transducers.

Shape Number d33 of EMFi [pC/N] Aperture [mm]

Planar P1 200 20 Fig. 2. Schematic diagram of the cross-section of F1.

Spherically focused F1 205 20
Spherically focused F2 205 30
most effective vibration mode of the EMFi is thickness-direction
vibration mode with polarization in the thickness direction. So the
electrodes were evaporated on the upper and lower surfaces of the
films. It is also corresponding to the objective requirement that
an air-coupled ultrasonic transducer can only excite longitudinal
waves in ultrasonic testing. The final overall thickness of the EMFi
prepared here is about 556̃0 ␮m.
Parameters of different types of EMFi are shown as follows in
Table2:
As for the type of transducers, focused air-coupled transducers
would increase measurement resolution in general. Therefore, even
though it is more difficult to fabricate than planar ones, researchers
are significantly interested in them. Since the acoustic velocity of air
is lower than that of liquids and solids, shorter wavelengths would
be achieved for the same frequency. Therefore, focused air-coupled
ultrasonic transducers can obtain similar spatial resolution in air at
a lower frequency [35].
Three air-coupled ultrasonic transducers are developed based
on EMFi. L1 is selected for manufacturing F1(spherically focused),
M1 for F2(spherically focused), and S1 is selected for P1(planar).
Each transducer includes six replaceable components: a BNC con-
nector, a nylon insulator, a brass backing, EMFi, an Al housing case
and a top cover. Transducer geometry and film piezoelectric coef-
ficient are given in Table 3.
The insulator, brass backing, and top cover are placed in
sequence into the housing case. EMFi is placed between the top
cover and the brass backing. Screw up four bolts on top cover and
the BNC connector at the end of the transducer, thus completing
assembling of the transducer prototype. The cross-section of F1 is
schematically shown in Fig. 2. Note that the pin of BNC connector
should intimately contact with the brass backing in order to avoid
open circuit of the transducer.
As mentioned before, it is more difficult to fabricate a spheri-
cally focused transducer than a planar one. It often causes wrinkles
and sensitivity decline when EMFi is stretched or compressed onto
a curved surface. But a focused transducer usually has much higher
sensitivity than a planar one [12,31]. In order to solve the problem
of creases when EMFi is curved, we followed a similar procedure
reported in [12] where a polished stainless steel ball bearing was
used to stretch metalized films so as to relieve creases. Here, a
hemispherical mold with the same radius as the spherically focused
transducers was manufactured and employed for pre-stressing of
the EMFi. Before adhering EMFi to brass backing, it would be put
onto the lower part of the mold and lidded with the upper part of
the mold for two days, during which period the upper part should
be rotated intermittently. The effect is shown in Fig. 3. The creases
are apparently reduced.
In this work, the aperture is 20 mm for P1 and F1 and 30 mm for
F2. The spherically curved fixtures for F1 and F2 have 40 mm radius
o o
of curvature and an active angular sensitivity of 15 and 22 for F1
and F2, respectively.
3. Experiments and discussion
3.1. Frequency response-laser vibration measurement
The experimental setup for laser vibration is schematically
illustrated in Fig. 4(a). EMFi ultrasonic transducer is placed on a
motor-controlled platform, which can move along the X and Z
directions. EMFi transducer is connected with a signal generator
(CTS-8077PR) whose signal waveform can be captured by means
of a PC and an oscilloscope (Tektronix MDO 300). The EMFi trans-
ducer and the laser beam should be adjusted such that the energy
indicator (Polytec OFV 2570) reaches the maximum value. The cen-
ter point of EMFi is selected as the testing point. First, the frequency
response of P1, F1 and F2 was tested under a short tone-burst sinu-
soidal excitation voltage with a Vpp of 100 V in a frequency range
from 0.1 to 0.8 MHz, as shown in Fig. 4(b).
We can find the resonance frequency of P1 (4̃20 kHz) is sub-
stantially higher than those of F1 (2̃80 kHz) and F2 (2̃60 kHz).
The bandwidth, namely the frequency span in which the trans-
ducer response is not more than 6 dB lower than the maximum,
of P1 (8̃00 kHz) is also larger than those of F1 (5̃30 kHz) and F2
(5̃10 kHz). It evidences the broadband character of EMFi transduc-
 J. Tang et al. / Sensors and Actuators A 296 (2019) 52–60
Fig. 3. EMFi transducers made (a)without using pre-stressing mold, (b)with pre-stressing mold.
Fig. 4. (a) Schematic view of the experimental setup for laser vibration measurements; (b) Frequency response of three EMFi transducers.
ers. The higher amplitude of F1 and F2 may result from both focused
structure and more homogeneous contact between EMFi and brass
backing with the presence of adhesive. For F1 and F2, EMFi and brass
backing were bonded with double-sided conductive tape. Instead,
EMFi in P1 was only mechanically clamped with the edge part on
the fixture, namely, there is no adhesive tape attached on EMFi
(no extra damp on the film) in P1. Therefore, it should vibrate in
a free vibration mode. It’s known that free vibration  films would
1
achieve higher resonance frequency (according to f˜ m , where
f is frequency response in free vibration mode, m represents the
mass of film) and narrower bandwidth of transducers (presence of
adhesive or damping would result in narrower bandwidth in free
vibration). However, a close comparison and a clear conclusion are
not made here, since the structure of P1 and F1 is different (planar
and focused respectively). It is known that the resonance frequency
of a freestanding EMFi will decrease by a factor of 2 when one of
the surface is constrained by e.g. bonding to a stiff substrate [36].
The resonance frequencies of F1 and F2 are slightly higher than half
of that of P1, which is probably attributed to the above-mentioned
pre-stressing treatment of the EMFi. Since EMFi is quite soft in the
thickness direction, the pre-stressing treatment may decrease the
thickness and increase the stiffness of the EMFi to certain extent.
Furthermore, to find out the influence of driving voltage on the
resonance frequency and bandwidth, three transducers are also
excited with a Vpp of 250 V in a broader frequency ranging from
0.1 to 3.0 MHz. Fig. 5 shows the vibration amplitude of three trans-
ducers around the respective resonance frequencies. The profile
of the curves under 250 Vpp has quite similar tendency with that
under 100 Vpp. However, the resonance frequency and bandwidth
do fluctuate with Vpp to certain degrees (dashed lines in Fig. 5).
f250Vpp −f100Vpp
The shifting rate is calculated by f100Vpp
, where f250Vpp and
f100Vpp are the resonance frequencies respectively under 250 Vpp
55
and 100 Vpp excitation voltage. Compared with that of 100 Vpp,
the resonance frequency of 250 Vpp is shifted by 6.1%, 7.7% and
2.3% for P1, F1 and F2, respectively. We attribute the shift to the
nonlinear behavior resulting from the internal cellular structure in
EMFi. The bandwidth fluctuation is 2.5%, 0.8% and 1.1% for P1, F1
and F2, respectively. The reason why P1 has the largest bandwidth
fluctuation is that there is no adhesive between EMFi and the brass
backing, thus less restrained when the film vibrates.
3.2. Excitation voltage and vibration amplitude
The transducers are excited with five-cycle short tone-burst
sinusoidal voltage at the respective resonance frequency (P1 at
4̃20 kHz, F1 at 2̃80 kHz and F2 at 2̃60 kHz) in order to achieve large
output signal with a Vpp ranging from 25 to 400 V. The Vpp of the
driving voltage is increased from 25 V to 400 V with an interval of
50 V. The laser beam was aligned to the geometrical center of the
surface of the transducers. Fig. 6 shows vibration amplitude as a
function of Vpp for P1, F1, and F2.
P1 exhibits the lowest amplitude of vibration, because P1 is
clamped only with top cover without bonding to the backing brass.
Overall, it can be concluded that all three transducers show a good
linearity on excitation voltage over the Vpp range from 50 to 400 V.
Note that excitation voltage over 400 Vpp may result in breakdown
of the film. In addition, the vibration amplitudes of positions other
than the center point are also recorded under a Vpp of 200 V. Four
radii of EMFi vibration surface distributed evenly in the redial direc-
tion are selected, which correspond to x-coordinate in Fig. 8. For
four evenly-spaced radii, there are 2 mm space between adjacent
testing points, a schematic diagram of testing points on P1 is shown
in Fig. 7.
As shown in Fig. 8, differences of vibration amplitudes of P1 test-
ing points are observed, because the absence of adhesive means less
56 J. Tang et al. / Sensors and Actuators A 296 (2019) 52–60
Fig. 5. Frequency response under a Vpp of 100 and 250 V for (a) P1; (b) F1; (c) F2.
Fig. 6. Dependence of signal amplitude on the excitation voltage for three trans-
ducers.
Fig. 7. Schematic diagram of testing points on P1.
support on the film so that the film can vibrate freely. Therefore, the
amplitude of testing points at the periphery of the cover demon-
strates less deviation from that of the center point and it may also
result from second or higher order bending vibration. On the con-
Fig. 8. Amplitude of different points on (a)P1 and (b)F1.
trary, although similar amplitude fluctuation is observed in F1, it
has an more stable overall downtrend of the result.
3.3. Frequency reponse-ultrasound measurement
Different from the laser measurement which detects the vibra-
tion of a single point on the surface, ultrasound measurement
can reveal the overall frequency responses of EMFi air-coupled
transducers as a whole working surface. The experiment is com-
pleted under pulse-echo mode, and the experimental arrangement
is shown in Fig. 9. Testing parameters are set as follows: frequency-
sweeping range is 0.2–0.8 MHz, with a step of 0.001 MHz. EMFi
transducers are excited under ten-cycle short tone-burst sinusoidal
signals with Hanning window. The results are shown in Fig. 10.
The resonance frequencies determined through ultrasound
measurements agree well with those obtained by laser measure-
ments with a difference of less than 5%. But the bandwidth of
transducers shows a relatively large decline. EMFi transducers
themselves can be considered as a band-pass filter and pulse-echo
mode means convolution operation to the original signals for two
times, therefore narrower bandwidths are obtained. As expected,
the ultrasound signal of F2 is obviously larger than that of F1 due to
its bigger aperture. This observation suggests that the aperture is an
important parameter for EMFi air-coupled transducers. In the laser
vibration measurements, only the surface displacement of individ-
ual testing point is detected, and hence the amplitude of frequency
response of F1 and F2 is approximately the same. But when taking
the vibrating surface as a whole, all the ultrasound energy theoreti-
cally concentrates on one point, therefore, larger aperture results in
larger acoustic amplitude. It can be read from Fig. 11 that the ampli-
tude of F2 under center frequency is 1.5 times that of F1, which
accords with the ratio of two transducers’ diameters.
 J. Tang et al. / Sensors and Actuators A 296 (2019) 52–60 57

Fig. 9. Frequency response experimental arrangement for ultrasound measurement under pulse-echo mode.

Table 4
Frequency response properties of the center point in transduces under a Vpp of 100
and 250 V.

No. Excitation voltage Bandwidth [MHz] Center frequency [MHz]

100 0.989 0.424

P1
250 1.014 0.450
100 0.643 0.272
F1
250 0.648 0.293
100 0.564 0.258
F2
250 0.558 0.264

tive Al block, so that the focal length of the transducers can be

Fig. 10. Frequency-sweeping response of three transducers.
3.4. Focal length
It has been proved that the focal distance of a transducer is
strongly influenced by two parameters [35]. One is the aperture
of the transducer because of the geometrical interference of the
ultrasonic waves emitted from each vibrating point on the EMFi
surface. The other one is the curvature of the EMFi surface [35]. The
curvature of the planar transducer P1 can be considered as infinite.
Under the pulse-echo mode, we excite a 5-cycle sinusoidal pulse
signal with Hanning window at the respective resonance frequency
of F1 and F2. A polished Al piece was used as the reflection block.
The surface of the Al piece must be smooth, otherwise the strength
of the echo signal will be strongly affected. The area of the reflecting
block is 40mm*40 mm, which is perpendicular to the acoustic beam
to ensure that most of the acoustic signal can be reflected back to
transducer.
The intensity of the echo signal was measured as a function of
the distance from the center of the EMFi transducer to the reflec-
determined. During the experiment, attention was paid to keep
the reflection plane of the Al block parallel and aligned with the
excitation surface of the transducer.
Fig. 11(a) and (b) show the filtered pulse transmitted between
the EMFi transducer F1 and the Al block in the time and frequency
domain, respectively. The measurements were done in pulse-echo
mode with an air gap distance of 4 cm. The working frequency of F1
is ∼280 kHz, which corresponds to the previous test (Table 4). The
pulse is well shaped and quite short with a good signal-to-noise
ratio, although the amplitude of the echo signal is relatively small
(less than 10 mV).
Fig. 12 shows the amplitude of the echo signal versus the air
gap distance for F1 (20 mm aperture) and F2 (30 mm aperture). It
can be seen that the focusing range of F1 is 35–38 mm and of F2
is 38–43 mm. Thus, the larger the aperture is, the longer the focal
length is.
3.5. Imaging experiment
In manufacturing industry, the samples are often tested in trans-
mission mode, which requires access to both sides of the samples
and thus does not lend itself easily to testing in an enclosure space.
In many industrial cases, only one side of the sample is accessible.

Fig. 11. Response signal of F1 in (a) time domain, (b) frequency domain.
58 J. Tang et al. / Sensors and Actuators A 296 (2019) 52–60
Fig. 12. Focus Length of F1 and F2.
Fig. 13. Schematic experimental setup for air-coupled ultrasonic Imaging.
Therefore, pulse-echo mode is promising in air-coupled ultrasonic
testing.
In this study, the ultrasonic imaging experiments are based on
EMFi transducer (F2) in pulse-echo mode. Two PMMA samples are
scanned. One is square-sink-hole sample with five steps, and two
sink holes on each step, and the side length of the square holes
range from 2 to12 mm. The other sample is circular-sink-sample
with no steps and the diameters of the sink holes ranges from 1 to
10 mm.
The spatial resolution of the scanning is 0.5 mm × 0.5 mm.
Transducer F2 is fixed on a platform suitable for air-coupled ultra-
sonic testing and the platform is driven by two servo motors along
X and Y axis, respectively, in order to precisely control the position
of transducer. The distance from the sample to the transducer is
about 38–43 mm, in accordance with the focus length of F2. The
testing system is schematically shown in Fig. 13.
There are two original signals, namely, five-cycle short tone-
burst sinusoidal signal for excitation of transducer and square pulse
signal for gate control signal with an amplification of 7.5. The move-
ment of transducer is controlled by means of a PC. Received echo
signals are then amplified before being displayed on an oscillo-
scope.
From the scanned images shown in Figs. 14 and 15, it can be seen
that the transducer has relatively good sensitivity. For the square-
sink-hole sample, the steps between the first to the forth terrace are
clearly recognized. The fifth step is less clear. A possible reason is
that the platform used here is equipped with belt pulleys along the
Y axis, resulting in lower accuracy for scanning small dimensions.
As for the position of the sink holes, all of them can be precisely
located except the ones at first terrace. Furthermore, the left edge of
the image is a little curving, for the determination of zero-position
depends on subjective judgement. The shape is well displayed and
Fig. 14. Ultrasonic imaging of square-sink-hole sample.
even the four 1 mm rounded corners are clearly visible. As for the
cycle-sink-hole sample, the shape and position of the holes are both
well recognized, although the boundary of 1 mm holes is obscure.
Compared with the image tested by means of EMFIT transducer
in pulse-echo mode [26], the images obtained in this study exhibit
less deformation of the shape of the sink holes and more detailed
condition of the bottom of the sink holes. Furthermore, compared
with the results achieved by means of Ultran transducers in [26],
EMFi transducers provide finer and more detailed features of the
testing samples. However, a quantitatively comparison is not done
since the experimental setups employed in both studies are differ-
ent.
4. Conclusion
In this paper, both planar and spherical air-coupled ultrasonic
transducers are developed based on EMFi (ferroelectret). The aper-
ture of P1 (Planar), F1 and F2 (both are spherically focused) is
20 mm, 20 mm and 30 mm respectively. During the fabrication pro-
cess of F1 and F2, a hemi-spherical mold is employed to prevent
creases created by adhering EMFi onto curved surface of brass back-
ing. The EMFis used here are prepared with commercially cellular
PP films. After being optimized through gas-diffusion expansion
(GDE), the EMFis have a thickness of 55–60 ␮m,and a piezoelectric
d33 coefficient of 200–205 pC/N. Characterization of the fabricated
transducers is performed through both laser and ultrasound mea-
surements. The planar P1 with a free-standing EMFi exhibits a
resonance frequency of 4̃20 kHz. The focused F1 and F2, with EMFi
bonded to the backing with conductive tape, show higher vibration
amplitude and lower resonance frequencies (2̃80 kHz and 2̃60 kHz
respectively) compared with P1. All the EMFi transducers fabricated
here exhibit a good linearity over a Vpp range from 50 V to 400 V.
Due to its larger aperture, F2 has longer focal length than F1.
With the advantages of high piezoelectricity and low acoustic
impedance, ferroelectrets are suitable for air-coupled ultrasonic
applications. Here, ultrasonic transducer prototypes are made with
easily accessible inexpensive cellular PP films. Note that a variety
of ferroelectrets with superior properities such as better thermal
stability and higher piezoelectricity have been reported [37]. Addi-
tionally, the structure of ferroelectrets can be purposely designed
and adjusted, which allows tuning of the transducer persormance
according to specific applications. Nevertheless, high sensitivity of
our prototypes is proved in the air-coupled ultrasonic imaging of
two PMMA samples with sink holes. Even the smallest holes with
a diameter of 1 mm are clearly detected, which demonstrates that
ferroelectrets are highly promising for noncontact ultrasonic imag-
ing and testing.
 J. Tang et al. / Sensors and Actuators A 296 (2019) 52–60
Fig. 15. Ultrasonic imaging of cycle-sink-hole sample.
Funding
This work was supported by the National Key Research
and Development Program of China [2016YFC0801903], and
the National Natural Science Foundation of China [11622430,
11774090, 51835003 and 11834008].
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Biographies
Yanxun Xiang received his M.S. in Acoustics from Tongji University (China) in 2003,
and Ph. D. in Mechanical engineering from East China University of Science and
Technology (ECUST, China) in 2011. Since 2017, he has been a professor of the
mechanical department at ECUST. Professor Xiang’s research focuses on the devel-
opment of quantitative methodologies for the nondestructive testing and evaluation
of structural materials. This includes the application of nonlinear ultrasound for the
characterization of creep, fatigue, stress-corrosion, and thermal damage in metals.
60 J. Tang et al. / Sensors and Actuators A 296 (2019) 52–60
Mingxi Deng was awarded his M.S. and Ph.D from Nanjing University (China) &
Tongji University (China), respectively. During 2000 to 2018, he worked as a pro-
fessor and doctoral supervisor in Logistical Engineering University. Now, Professor
Deng is doing his research in Chongqing University as a professor. He mainly devoted
himself to ultrasonic testing, non-linear ultrasound and the evaluation of materials
& their structures.
Xunlin Qiu received his Ph.D in Condensed Matter Physics from Tongji University
(China) in 2006. From 2006 to 2017, he worked at the group of Applied-Condensed
Matter Physics at the University of Potsdam first as a postdoc and then became a
senior scientist. He obtained his Habilitation from University of Potsdam in 2017.
Since 2017 he is a senior staff member in the Institute for Print and Media Technol-
ogy at Chemnitz University of Technology. His main research interest is functional
dielectrics and electrets, piezoelectric polar polymer films and non-polar polymer
foams, and their applications.
Fuzhen Xuan now serves as the vice-principal of East China University of Science
and Technology (ECUST, China), and he is also a professor in School of Mechanical
and Power Engineering. Fuzhen Xuan received his M.S. from Shandong Industry
University in 1996 (merged with Shandong University in 2000), and Ph.D from
ECUST in 2002. His research field is structural integrity, high-temperature mate-
rials and their structural strength etc., which encompasses 2C (Creep deformation
and corrosion), 2F (Fatigue and Fracture), 2M (damage Measuring and Monitoring)
problems.
Likun Tong has achieved a master degree in School of Mechanical and Power Engi-
neering in East China University of Science and Technology, 2018. During which
period, he also devoted himself to the research of design and fabrication of EMFi
transducers.
Jianying Tang is now studying for a master degree in School of Mechanical and
Power Engineering, East China University of Science and Technology (ECUST, China),
where she also obtained undergraduate degree in 2018. Her researches are mainly
focused on design and fabrication of EMFi transducers.