Tunable phononic crystals based on piezoelectric composites with 1-3 connectivity

Phononic crystals made of piezoelectric composites with 1–3 connectivity are studied theoretically and experimentally. It is shown that they present Bragg band gaps that depend on the periodic electrical boundary conditions. These structures have improved properties compared to phononic crystals composed of bulk piezoelectric elements, especially the existence of larger band gaps and the fact that they do not require severe constraints on their aspect ratios. Experimental results present an overall agreement with the theoretical predictions and clearly show that the pass bands and stop bands of the device under study are easily tunable by only changing the electrical boundary conditions applied on each piezocomposite layer.