Ultrasonic Levitation

Position : Research Assitant
Workplace : AI Media Lab, Art&Technology Department, Sogang University
Category : media technology research, ultrasounds, feasibility study

Timeline : 6 months

Skills : Prototyping, hardware & software testing, DSP, programming, technical documentation

Concept

This research project was a feasibility study to see if it was possible to create a sculpture by making particles of polystyrene levitate. The idea came from a paper(1) that managed to make one particle of polystyrene levitate with ultrasound transducers.

1. A. Marzo, T. Corkett and B. W. Drinkwater, "Ultraino: An Open Phased-Array System for Narrowband Airborne Ultrasound Transmission," in IEEE Transactions on Ultrasonics, Ferroelectrics, and Frequency Control, vol. 65, no. 1, pp. 102-111, Jan. 2018, doi: 10.1109/TUFFC.2017.2769399.

How it works

To create an 8x8 array of ultrasonic transducers, we 3D printed a base to hold them and got the PCB driver board professionnally soldered. The PCB is connected to an Arduino Mega through its pins and that's how we send the wave signal. The simulation software helps us visualize the ultrasound array and assign each transducer the proper signal. Once the proper signal is sent, we can put a 2mm polystyrene particle to levitate in the middle of the array.

We could barely reproduce the results from the original study, so it was decided we would not pursue our research any further.

Tools I used

Arduino Mega, Arduino Nano, Arduino Software
AcousticField3D
PCB
Ultrasonic transducers
Ultrasonic microphone
Oscilloscope, multimeter
Power supplier
3D printer