Broadband plate-type acoustic metamaterial for low-frequency sound attenuation

We show experimentally that plate-type acoustic metamaterials can serve to totally prohibit low frequency structure-borne sound at selective resonance frequencies ranging from 650 to 3500 Hz. Our metamaterial structures are consisting of a periodic arrangement of composite stubs (tungsten/silicone rubber) deposited on a thin aluminium plate. We report that these metamaterials present a broadband gap of out-of-plane modes at frequencies where the relevant sound wavelength in air is about three orders of magnitude larger than the plate thickness. Confinement and waveguiding of structure-borne sound in this sub-wavelength resonant regime is also experimentally evidenced and discussed.