An ultrasonic inspection apparatus includes: an acquisition unit acquiring a signal indicating a fundamental wave and a second harmonic of an ultrasonic wave, which are obtained by the ultrasonic wave being scanned over an inspection object through a medium, at each scanning position; a calculation unit calculating a value obtained by dividing a second harmonic amplitude by a square of a fundamental wave amplitude, at each scanning position; and an output unit outputting information on a defect of the inspection object, based on the value obtained by dividing the second harmonic amplitude by the square of the fundamental wave amplitude.

A multi-material inspection system and velocity measurement method of critically refracted longitudinal wave based on single-angle wedges belong to the field of nondestructive testing of high-end equipment. The method includes the following steps: designing a transmitting wedge and a receiving wedge with the same inclination angle, and building phased array ultrasonic-based inspection systems of critically refracted longitudinal wave; estimating a longitudinal wave velocity range of a material to be tested, calculating and optimizing a phased array ultrasonic delay law, and building a relation between a longitudinal wave velocity and an amplitude of critically refracted longitudinal wave; reading and interpolating the arrival time of a received signal, and calculating a longitudinal wave velocity of the material to be tested; determining an optimal delay law, and exciting and receiving a critically refracted longitudinal wave.

An acoustic technique can be used for performing non-destructive testing. For example, a method for acoustic evaluation of a target can include generating respective acoustic transmission events via selected transmitting ones of a plurality of electroacoustic transducers, and in response to the respective acoustic transmission events, receiving respective acoustic echo signals using other receiving ones of the plurality of electroacoustic transducers, and coherently summing representations of the respective received acoustic echo signals to generate a pixel or voxel value corresponding to a specified spatial location of the target. Such summation can include weighting contributions from the respective representations to suppress contributions from acoustic propagation paths outside a specified angular range with respect to a surface on or within the target, such as to provide an acoustic path-filtered total focusing method (PF-TFM).

The disclosure discloses an air-coupled ultrasonic detection method and device based on a defect probability reconstruction algorithm. The method includes the following steps: determining the excitation frequency of a transmitting air-coupled transducer according to a frequency dispersion curve of guided waves and the thickness of a to-be-detected piece; determining the group velocity of an antisymmetric mode according to the excitation frequency, and determining the inclination angle of the transmitting/receiving air-coupled transducer according to the Snell law; obtaining an initial waveform of a defect-free test piece as reference data by adopting a same-side penetration method, then rotating the transmitting/receiving transducer by 360 degrees by taking the Z direction as an axis at preset angle intervals by adopting a rotary scanning method, collecting N groups of signal data of the to-be-detected piece again, comparing the N groups of signal data with the reference data to determine whether the signal characteristics have great changes or not, calculating the defect distribution probability on the to-be-detected piece, and carrying out defect imaging on a rotating coverage area of the transmitting/receiving air-coupled transducer according to the defect distribution probability. According to the method, the precision of traditional air-coupled ultrasonic X and Y scanning detection is improved, and compared with a complex imaging technology, the air-coupled ultrasonic detection method consumes less time.

The use of nondestructive inspection (NDI) capabilities for the detection of fatigue cracks extending from fastener holes in multi-layered metallic structures without removing the fastener; including at least the use of a probe guide containing a UT sensor and either an inertial measurement unit (IMU) or a rotary encoder, and either of these options could be applied in testing of either raised head fasteners or flush fasteners.

The use of nondestructive inspection (NDI) capabilities for the detection of fatigue cracks extending from fastener holes in multi-layered metallic structures without removing the fastener; including at least the use of a probe guide containing a UT sensor and either an inertial measurement unit (IMU) or a rotary encoder, and either of these options could be applied in testing of either raised head fasteners or flush fasteners.

A system and a method embodiment or automatic inspection of branch wells is provided. An exemplary system includes a scanning head including an ultrasonic probe, wherein the ultrasonic probe includes a convex crystal. A track is mounted to a branch pipe welded to a main pipe, wherein the scanning head mounts to the track, and wherein the scanning head moves the ultrasonic probe along the track. The system includes a controller configured to display an image based on data provided from the ultrasonic probe.

The invention relates to a wafer chuck for handling a wafer, in particular in a wafer process device, further preferably in a scanning acoustic microscope, with a fixing device for the wafer, wherein the fixing device has a free space for receiving the wafer and a holder with multiple wafer contact fingers, which are movable relative to the holder for a wafer. The wafer contact fingers are arranged annularly around the free space for the wafer, preferably in one plane. The wafer contact fingers can be moved in the direction of the free space for the wafer or can be moved away from the free space for the wafer. One actuation device for the wafer contact fingers is provided and, when the actuation device is actuated, the wafer contact fingers are moved or can be moved simultaneously.

The present disclosure enables apparatus and methods for tracking medications and/or product units via smart-packaging concepts. Embodiments include sensors that monitor the state of a blister-card package having an unpatterned lidding film by measuring the impedance of each dispensing region of the lidding film that defines a portion of a blister. In some embodiments, the impedance is measured via a plurality of contact points arranged on opposite sides of each dispensing region, where the contact points are resistively or capacitively coupled with the lidding film. In some embodiments, the impedance map of a measurement region on the blister card is derived via electrical impedance tomography or electrical resistance tomography, where the measurement region includes a plurality of dispensing regions.

A method and system of predicting a muscle characteristic using ultrasound. The characteristic may include a tenderness characteristic and/or a strength characteristic. An analysis of muscle structure is performed for a sample using ultrasound data of the sample. The analysis may include determining a relative number of bundles, fascicles, sarcomeres, fibers, and/or sheath thickness from the ultrasound data. Thereafter, the muscle characteristic is predicted for the sample based on the analysis.