Nonlinearity parameters B/A and C/A and wave equation for heterogeneous media containing negative stiffness inclusions

Abstract

This work considers nonlinear propagation in a medium consisting of a low volume fraction of metamaterial inclusions dispersed in a fluid-like material. The metamaterial inclusions of interest are assumed to possess non-monotonic stress-strain constitutive relations, which results in regimes of negative stiffness. For modeling purposes, the constitutive relation for these inclusions is approximated with an expansion to third order in volume strain with coefficients that can be tuned with the geometry of the metamaterial structure and ambient pressure. A far-reaching goal of this research is to model the hysteretic response of the heterogeneous medium resulting from metamaterial inclusion snapping events and the associated effect on acoustic disturbances that cycle through regimes of both positive and negative stiffness. As an initial step, results are presented here for small but finite-amplitude disturbances limited to local regions of the constitutive relation. For this case, the quadratic and cubic nonlinearity parameters B/A and C/A, respectively, as traditionally defined for fluids are obtained. An evolution equation with both quadratic and cubic nonlinearity is also obtained. Numerical solutions of the evolution equation illustrate nonlinear waveform distortion as a function of the volume fraction and constitutive behavior of the inclusions. [Work supported by ARL:UT McKinney Fellowship in Acoustics.]