Diffraction of an Acoustic Wave by a Rigid Rectangular Plate

Abstract

The diffraction of a plane acoustic wave by an infinitely thin and rigid rectangular plate is treated theoretically for the case of normal incidence. The rigorous solution satisfying the wave equation and the boundary conditions is obtained by the use of modified Weber-Schafheitlin integrals and hypergeometric polynomials. The far field, the diffraction coefficient, the total pressure on the plate and its time average are expressed as functions of k a and k b , where 2 a and 2 b are the side lengths of the plate and k is the wave number.