A metallic diaphragm disk incorporating a piezoelectric material bonded thereto and operatively coupled to a base rim of a housing provides for closing an open-ended cavity at the first end of the housing. At least one inertial mass is either incorporated in or attached to the housing. A plastic film adhesively bonded to at least one of an outer rim of the housing or an outer-facing surface of the disk provides for receiving an adhesive acoustic interface material to provide for coupling the housing to the skin of a test subject.

An ultrasonic probe includes a capacitive micromachined ultrasonic transducer (cMUT) array configured to generate ultrasonic waves, an integrated circuit to which the cMUT array is bonded, and a flexible printed circuit board having one end connected to the integrated circuit to output signals to the integrated circuit, the integrated circuit including pads provided on the integrated circuit and an anisotropic conductive film (ACF) provided on the pads, and the one end of the flexible printed circuit board being connected to the ACF to thereby connect the flexible printed circuit board to the integrated circuit.

A metallic diaphragm disk incorporating a piezoelectric material bonded thereto and operatively coupled to a base rim of a housing provides for closing an open-ended cavity at the first end of the housing. In one aspect, plastic film adhesively bonded to at least one of an outer rim of the housing or an outer-facing surface of the disk provides for receiving an adhesive acoustic interface material to provide for coupling the housing to the skin of a test subject. In another aspect, an outer-facing surface of a base portion of the housing provides for receiving an adhesive acoustic interface material to provide for coupling the housing to the skin of a test subject, at least one inertial mass is operatively coupled to a central portion of the metallic diaphragm disk, and the opening in the first end of the housing is closed with a cover.

There are provided an ultrasonic apparatus and a beamforming method for the ultrasonic apparatus. According to an aspect, an ultrasonic apparatus includes a 2D array transducer in which a plurality of elements are arranged in a plurality of rows and columns; a signal supplier configured to supply an ultrasonic signal to the 2D array transducer; a first delayer configured to delay the ultrasonic signal to output a plurality of first delay signals corresponding to any one of the number of rows and the number of columns; and a second delayer configured to delay one of the plurality of first delay signals to output a plurality of second delay signals corresponding to the other one of the number of rows and the number of columns, and transmit the plurality of second delay signals to the 2D array transducer.

The invention relates to a continuous monitoring system which will monitor the pipes without the need of shutting down of the plants. The major issues in designing such a system using magnetostriction as per prior art is the loss of magnetization of the permanent magnets used to provide the magnetic bias and also the disbonding of interfaced adhesives with which the magnetostrictive ribbons are bonded at high temperatures. The invention identifies a novel sensor which can be taken up to high temperatures without any loss of signal strength, this is achieved by generating guided waves using a special amorphous magnetostrictive ribbons. L(0, 2) mode waves are generated using these ribbons to monitor pipes working at high temperatures as per the invention.

A crack detecting system operable to detect cracks along a conduit or structure includes a tool movable along a conduit or structure and having at least one sensing device for sensing cracks in a wall of the conduit or structure, and a processor operable to process an output of the at least one sensing device. Responsive to processing of the output by the processor, the processor is operable to determine cracks at the wall of the conduit or structure. The at least one sensing device employs excitation in the form of a high current continuous or pulse wave that is applied to a magneto-mechanical impedance transducer/sensor coil to generate a mechanical wave in the conduit or structure.

A high frequency magnetostrictive transducer includes a magnetostrictive rod or wire inserted co-axially into a driving coil, wherein the driving coil includes a coil arrangement with a plurality of small coil segments along the magnetostrictive rod or wire; wherein frequency operation of the high frequency magnetostrictive transducer is controlled by a length of the small coil segments and a material type of the magnetostrictive rod or wire. This design of the high frequency magnetostrictive transducer retains the beneficial aspects of the magnetostrictive design, while reducing its primary drawback, lower frequency operation.

There is provided a method for manufacturing, or for use in manufacturing a flexible ultrasonic transducer array and the resultant ultrasonic transducer array. The method includes providing a layer of piezoelectric material onto a foil substrate and using additive techniques to apply a plurality of electrodes to a surface of the piezoelectric material such that the electrodes are arranged in an electrode array and to apply a plurality of electrical conduction tracks and a plurality of electrical connectors to the surface of the piezoelectric material or to a layer of dielectric material provided on the surface of the piezoelectric material, such that respective electrical conduction tracks electrically connect a respective electrode to a respective electrical connector. The additive techniques comprise at least one of: masking, deposition, photo patterning, printing or patterned coating.

A magnetostrictive position measuring system includes a waveguide, an excitation generator configured to generate an excitation signal, a target magnet configured to generate a magnetostrictive response in response to the excitation signal, one or more sensing elements and a controller. The sensing elements are configured to generate at least one electrical response signal based on the magnetostrictive response that includes a longitudinal wave indicator and a torsional wave indicator. The controller is configured to identify the longitudinal wave and torsional wave indicators, calculate a first candidate position of the target magnet along the longitudinal axis based on the longitudinal wave indicator, calculate a second candidate position of the target magnet along the longitudinal axis based on the torsional wave indicator and generate an output based on the first and second candidate positions.