A novel gyroscope based on the slow surface acoustic wave in a phononic metamaterial

Abstract

Limited to the direct modulation on the surface acoustic wave (SAW) by the rotation, the conventional SAW gyroscopes incur weak Coriolis effects and gyroscopic effects. In this paper, we innovatively utilize a phononic metamaterial (PM) operated at whispering-gallery modes (WGMs) as the vehicle for the Coriolis effect rather than SAW itself. The gyroscopic effects of this PM are investigated, and a new SAW gyroscope is subsequently proposed based on the slow SAW in PM. We show, combining theoretical modeling and finite element method simulation, that the rate of rotation can linearly induce the splitting of WGMs and modulate the phase velocity of SAW down to 4600 m/s (initial phase velocity of 5355 m/s); the direction of rotation results in the chiral symmetry of the PM vibration and the asymmetric distribution of the transmissive SAW. Besides, the proposed SAW gyroscope measures the angular velocity by detecting the phase shift resulting from rotation-dependent slow SAW in PM, obtaining a sensitivity of 0.016 deg/Hz when 50-cell PM. Compared with the existing SAW gyroscopes based on phase velocity modulation, the gyroscopic gain factor in this paper is enhanced by 430–1600 times. This work jumps out of the framework of directly modulating SAW in gyroscopes and provides an innovative scheme of the indirect modulations from the rotation-dependent PM on SAW, showing excellent performance and potential for angular velocity measurement in extreme environments.