Acoustic transmission enhancement through a soft interlayer with a reactance boundary

Research has shown that acoustic transmission enhancement (ATE) can occur in stiff materials with high acoustic impedance that include a soft interlayer with low acoustic impedance inserted between them without any opening (i.e., without any links between the two stiff materials). Previously, ATE was induced either by coupling acoustic surface waves or Love waves with the Fabry-Perot resonant modes inside the apertures or by the locally resonant modes of the structure. However, in this article ATE is achieved using wave-vector redistribution induced by a reactance boundary. An optimal boundary was designed to adjust the wave vector in the propagation direction, decreasing reflection caused by impedance differences. The role of boundary conditions on ATE was also clarified.