Transmission Line Based Metamaterials for Acoustic Waves

We present our recent work on a one-dimensional acoustic negative refractive index metamaterial based on the concept of dual transmission line extensively investigated in microwave engineering. The proposed structure consists of an acoustic waveguide periodically loaded with membranes realizing the function of series “capacitances” and transversally connected open channels realizing shunt “inductances”. It exhibits a negative refractive index band over almost one octave, from 0.6 to 1 kHz. Using formal analogies, we describe how simple acoustic circuit models can be used for efficient design of metamaterials both in terms of dispersion and impedance.