Wave propagation in a piezoelectric coupled solid medium

Abstract

Shear horizontal (SH) wave propagation in a semi-infinite solid medium surface bonded by a layer of piezoelectric material abutting the vacuum is investigated in this paper. The dispersive characteristics and the mode shapes of the deflection, the electric potential, and the electric displacements in the thickness direction of the piezoelectric layer are obtained theoretically. Numerical simulations show that the asymptotic phase velocities for different modes are the Bleustein surface wave velocity or the shear horizontal wave velocity of the pure piezoelectric medium. Besides, the mode shapes of the deflection, electric potential, and electric displacement show different distributions for different modes and different wave number. These results can be served as a benchmark for further analyses and are significant in the modeling of wave propagation in the piezoelectric coupled structures.