Micro-wire sensors comprise a conductive sensing element situated above a substrate. The sensing element can be fixed to the substrate at one or more ends and can be formed by patterning a conductive layer deposited on a flexible or other substrate. Conductive connecting pads and bias resistors can be formed with the sensing element in a common conductive layer.

A hearing device, particularly a hearing aid, has a housing, a signal processing unit arranged in the housing, a first sound generator disposed in the housing, and a second sound generator. The first sound generator and the second sound generator are configured to convert an output signal from the signal processing unit into sound. The second sound generator is a thermo-acoustic transducer.

Disclosed are a method, system and controller for simultaneously verifying amplitude and temperature parameters of an electrical-acoustic conversion device, including: inputting a sweep signal to the electrical-acoustic conversion device; testing the amplitude of the electrical-acoustic conversion device while adjusting the gain of the whole frequency band of the sweep signal until the maximum value of the tested amplitude is a maximum amplitude parameter Xmax, and testing the temperature of a voice coil at this moment; and if the tested temperature of the voice coil at this moment is higher or lower than Tmax, gradually reducing/increasing the gain of the sweep signal in the frequency band above a gain improvement frequency point until the tested temperature of the voice coil is Tmax, and then maintaining the gain of the sweep signal for a predetermined period of time and then testing the performance of the electrical-acoustic conversion device.

A method for making thermoacoustic device includes following steps. A substrate having a first surface and second surface is provided. The first surface defines a plurality of grids. Grooves are formed on each of the plurality of grids. A first electrode and a second electrode are formed on each grid. The first electrode is spaced from the second electrode. One of the grooves is located between the first electrode and the second electrode. A number of carbon nanotube wires are applied on the first surface and electrically connected to the first electrode and the second electrode. A thermoacoustic device array is formed on the substrate by separating the carbon nanotube wires. A number of thermoacoustic device is formed by cutting the substrate according to the grids.

Described herein is the use of large phase transformational strain in relaxor ferroelectric single crystals for broadband sound generation. The technique exploits the thermo-optical triggering and thus an opto-acoustic effect of ferroelectric phase transformation piezocrystals under mechanical bias conditions.

In one aspect, the present invention provides nano-scale heaters, such as nano-scale thermoacoustic loudspeakers comprising suspended metal nanobridges prepared using atomic layer deposition (ALD). The loudspeakers of the invention are capable of producing audible sound when stimulated with an electrical current or other energetic stimulus. In another aspect, the present invention provides methods of preparing and using such nanodevices.

A pressure wave generating element that includes: a first solid insulating layer having a first principal surface; a first metal layer on the first principal surface of the first solid insulating layer; a second metal layer disposed at a distance from the first metal layer in a thickness direction of the first solid insulating layer such that the first solid insulating layer is located between the first metal layer and the second metal layer; a first electrode electrically connected to a first end side of the first metal layer and a second end side of the second metal layer; and a second electrode electrically connected to a third end side of the first metal layer and a fourth end side of the second metal layer.

A condenser microphone and a method for discriminates a first segment and a second segment in a spoken sound, is provided by using carbon nanotube bundles as capacitor materials. Such capacitor capacitance varies due to the quantum thermal mechanism of CNTs when a spoken sound containing vowel segments and consonant segments passes through the CNTs, so that the vowel segments and the consonant segments can be detected and separated.

A MEMS transducer for interacting with a volume flow of a fluid includes a substrate including a cavity, and an electromechanical transducer connected to the substrate in the cavity and including an element deformable along a lateral movement direction, wherein a deformation of the deformable element along the lateral movement direction and the volume flow of the fluid are causally related.

A method for making a thermoacoustic device array includes the following step. A substrate having a surface is provided. The surface defines a grid having a number of cells. A number of holes are defined on each of the cells. A first electrode and a second electrode are formed on each of the cells. The first electrode is spaced from the second electrode, and one row of the holes is located between the first electrode and the second electrode. A sound wave generator is applied on the substrate and electrically connected to the first electrode and the second electrode. The sound wave generator is suspended over the holes. The sound wave generator is divided according to the cells.