The Effect of Node Position and Multi Particle Levitation on the Acoustic Levitation of Tissue Paper
Acoustic levitation is a phenomenon that, while highly useful, is not easily obtained. If the process could be streamlined and made more accessible, then its benefits could reach a greater number of individuals. Acoustics levitation could be used in a number of different areas including transportation, corrosive and zero-gravity storage, and materials engineering. The purpose of this experiment, given a 40 kHz ultrasonic transducer, was to determine the effects of node position and simultaneous levitation of two particles on the duration that those particles were in the air. There were three node positions tested in the experiment- top, middle, and bottom- all created by a single standing wave. The tissue paper was placed into the nodes of the wave, and the time in the air was recorded and used to run statistical tests. At times, two pieces of tissue paper were placed into the same standing wave, and the levitation duration of both was taken. The independent variables in this experiment were the node position and the addition of a second particle. The second particle was only inserted in the case of a stable wave. The dependent variable in this experiment was the duration of levitation. A total of 101 trials were conducted to ensure the data was usable, to allow for more variation, and to look for any patterns in the data, as a Descriptive analysis was used to test for significance. The Descriptive analysis test consisted of an ANOVA test to find the effect that node position had on the levitation duration, and a Two Sample T-Test to find the effect that simultaneous levitation had. The ANOVA returned that node position had no effect on the duration, while the T-Test found that the simultaneous levitation of particles had an effect.
Research Conducted By:
Anthony Andrzejewski
Cousino High School
William Niedbala
Sterling Heights High School
Warren Consolidated Schools