Patent ID: 8769753

Claim:
An appliance for cleaning teeth, comprising: an appliance body ( 12 ); a system for producing a slurry of microbubbles ( 20 ) and directing them to the region of the teeth to be cleaned; and a system for producing ultrasound signal beams ( 22 ) with a frequency in the range of 100 KHz to 1 MHz, directed to and in said frequency range for actuating the microbubbles for cleaning, wherein the system for producing the ultrasound signals includes (a) an array of transducer elements ( 40 ) to produce the ultrasound signals; wherein some of the transducer elements are separately power driven to provide separate power control over their associated ultrasound signals, and at least one of the following: (b) an amplitude modulation assembly ( 51 ) for modulating the amplitude of the ultrasound signals in accordance with an amplitude modulation signal; and (c) a frequency modulation system ( 61 ) for changing the frequency of the ultrasound signals over a predetermined frequency modulation range in accordance with a frequency modulation signal.