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US 4,250,474 AGranted
Continuous beam steering acoustic wave transducer
AssigneeHughes Aircraft Company
InventorThomas R. Joseph
Life of this patent
Estimating the term…
Abstract
There is hereinafter described an integral transducer geometry which provides for the angle of an acoustic wave beam, interacting with an optical beam, to be varied as a continuous function of the transducer drive energy frequency whereby the efficiency of optical beam deflection remains constant over a large bandwidth.
Claims7
A continuous beam steering acoustic wave transducer, comprising:
- a nonperiodic transducer structure responsive to acoustic energy coupled thereto, said structure having a centerline axis and including a plurality of interdigital electrodes with varying interelectrode spacings and angular relationships with respect to said centerline axis, said interelectrode spacings determining which of said electrodes actively relate to any particular frequency of said acoustic energy, and said angular relationships determining the propagation direction associated with said electrodes.
In an acoustooptic device having an acoustic wave launching substrate, a continuous beam steering acoustic wave transducer, comprising:
- a nonperiodic transducer structure responsive to acoustic energy coupled thereto, said structure having a centerline axis and including a plurality of interdigital electrodes with varying interelectrode spacings and angular relationships with respect to said centerline axis, said interelectrode spacings determining the propagation direction associated with said electrodes.
An acoustooptic device, comprising:
- a substrate having a planar surface and capable of supporting surface acoustic wave energy;
- a nonperiodic transducer structure responsive to acoustic energy coupled thereto, said structure having a centerline axis and including a plurality of interdigital electrodes with varying interelectrode spacings and angular relationships with respect to said centerline axis.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.