Acoustic and Elastic Waves: Recent Trends in Science and Engineering

Elastic waves in the active (ultrasound) and passive form (acoustic emission)
provide an ideal approach for the non-destructive inspection of materials. They
are used for all types of materials and structures, having many advantages over
other traditional measurements. Although they are already applied in a usual
basis in the structural health monitoring of structures, new challenges arise. These
are related to pushing the limit of the characterization capacity further: detecting
smaller cracks, providing more information on the condition of the material,
predicting the useful life time, and characterizing new innovative materials that
have not been tested before.
The articles contained in this issue/book include a broad range of materials
from masonry and concrete to ceramics, composites, 3D printed metals and
medical prosthetics and structures from cultural heritage towers and concrete
beams to marine and aeronautic structures and solar panels. Characterization
concerns the fracture mode, remaining fatigue life, disbonds in bonded stiffeners,
localization of defects, condition of injection molding tools and many others.
We believe that this book constitutes an up-to-date collection of cutting edge
applications of acoustic/elastic wave techniques, many of which were presented in
the International Conference on Emerging Technologies in Non-Destructive
Testing (ETNDT6) in Brussels, 27–29 May 2015. We wish to thank all the authors
for submitting their work and the reviewers who contributed to the high final
quality of the presented studies.
Dimitrios G. Aggelis and Nathalie Godin
Guest Editors