Ultrasonic trapping of gases

Article By:

Tuckermann, Rudolf Institute for Coastal Research, Physical and Chemical Analysis, GKSS Research Centre, Geesthacht GmbH, Germany.

Bauerecker, Sigurd Institute of Physical and Theoretical Chemistry, Technical University of Braunschweig, Braunschweig, Germany.

Last reviewed:2004

DOI:https://doi.org/10.1036/1097-8542.YB041145

Acoustic levitation has been applied as a technique for suspending liquid and solid samples of micrometer-to-millimeter range in the pressure nodes of a stationary ultrasonic field (SUSF). This effect was discovered in the 1930s and mainly developed in the 1970s and 1980s by the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) and the European Space Agency (ESA), who used this technique to fix small samples for various zero-gravity experiments in their space laboratories. However, in the last two decades acoustic levitation has also been applied as a useful and powerful tool for handling small samples under terrestrial conditions, that is, with gravity. Several investigations based on acoustic levitation have been carried out in different research areas, such as fluid dynamics, materials, atmospheric sciences, and analytical chemistry.

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