Analysis of the coupling between shear horizontal plate waves and liquids: Application to the measurement of the shear rigidity modulus of glycerol solutions

This article presents an acoustic wave viscometer based on the shear horizontal acoustic plate mode excited by interdigital transducers on a ST-cut quartz substrate. A theoretical model, which is an extension of the plate effective permittivity function taking into account the presence of liquids, is developed in order to predict the phase and attenuation variations versus the viscosity of liquid. These results are discussed and compared to those of models from the literature such as variational or perturbation methods. The measured results for aqueous solutions of glycerol show linear dependence between the phase and attenuation variations and the square root of liquid viscosity, and are consistent with the theoretical results. The device can be used for viscosity measurements up to 1000 mPa s. For higher viscosities, the viscoelastic behavior of the solution appears and the shear rigidity modulus must be taken into account. The value of μ∞=2.5×109 N m2 has been obtained for glycerol by fitting the theoretical curves to the experimental points.