Patent ID: 9741335
Date: 2017-08-22
CPC Classifications: G10K,H04R

Claim:
1. An acoustic transducer system for ultrasonic imaging, comprising: an array of sub-wavelength ultrasonic transducer elements each configured to generate an ultrasonic acoustic emission within an ultrasonic frequency band between 1 and 15 MHz in response to received electromagnetic energy within an electromagnetic frequency band between 1 GHz and 10 GHz; at least one electromagnetically resonant element with an electromagnetic resonance within the electromagnetic frequency band coupled to each of the sub-wavelength ultrasonic transducer elements; an electromagnetic transmission module configured to modify one or more characteristics of transmitted electromagnetic energy to effectuate an acoustic emission by the array of sub-wavelength transducer elements according to an acoustic transmission pattern corresponding to the respective electromagnetic resonance characteristics of at least some of the electromagnetically resonant elements coupled to the sub-wavelength ultrasonic transducer elements; and a common port configured to facilitate electromagnetic communication with each of the electromagnetically resonant elements coupled to the sub-wavelength transducer elements, wherein a physical diameter of each individual sub-wavelength ultrasonic transducer element is less than one-half of an effective wavelength of the highest frequency of the acoustic emissions.