A Wireless Passive Sensing System for Displacement/Strain Measurement in Reinforced Concrete Members.

In this study, we show a wireless passive sensing system embedded in a reinforced concrete member successfully being employed for the measurement of relative displacement and strain in a simply supported beam experiment. The system utilizes electromagnetic coupling between the transceiver antenna located outside the beam, and the sensing probes placed on the reinforcing bar (rebar) surface inside the beam. The probes were designed in the form of a nested split-ring resonator, a metamaterial-based structure chosen for its compact size and high sensitivity/resolution, which is at µm/microstrains level. Experiments were performed in both the elastic and plastic deformation cases of steel rebars, and the sensing system was demonstrated to acquire telemetric data in both cases. The wireless measurement results from multiple probes are compared with the data obtained from the strain gages, and an excellent agreement is observed. A discrete time measurement where the system records data at different force levels is also shown. Practical issues regarding the placement of the sensors and accurate recording of data are discussed. The proposed sensing technology is demonstrated to be a good candidate for wireless structural health monitoring (SHM) of reinforced concrete members by its high sensitivity and wide dynamic range.

Wireless measurement of elastic and plastic deformation by a metamaterial-based sensor.

We report remote strain and displacement measurement during elastic and plastic deformation using a metamaterial-based wireless and passive sensor. The sensor is made of a comb-like nested split ring resonator (NSRR) probe operating in the near-field of an antenna, which functions as both the transmitter and the receiver. The NSRR probe is fixed on a standard steel reinforcing bar (rebar), and its frequency response is monitored telemetrically by a network analyzer connected to the antenna across the whole stress-strain curve. This wireless measurement includes both the elastic and plastic region deformation together for the first time, where wired technologies, like strain gauges, typically fail to capture. The experiments are further repeated in the presence of a concrete block between the antenna and the probe, and it is shown that the sensing system is capable of functioning through the concrete. The comparison of the wireless sensor measurement with those undertaken using strain gauges and extensometers reveals that the sensor is able to measure both the average strain and the relative displacement on the rebar as a result of the applied force in a considerably accurate way. The performance of the sensor is tested for different types of misalignments that can possibly occur due to the acting force. These results indicate that the metamaterial-based sensor holds great promise for its accurate, robust and wireless measurement of the elastic and plastic deformation of a rebar, providing beneficial information for remote structural health monitoring and post-earthquake damage assessment.

Wireless displacement sensing enabled by metamaterial probes for remote structural health monitoring.

We propose and demonstrate a wireless, passive, metamaterial-based sensor that allows for remotely monitoring submicron displacements over millimeter ranges. The sensor comprises a probe made of multiple nested split ring resonators (NSRRs) in a double-comb architecture coupled to an external antenna in its near-field. In operation, the sensor detects displacement of a structure onto which the NSRR probe is attached by telemetrically tracking the shift in its local frequency peaks. Owing to the NSRR's near-field excitation response, which is highly sensitive to the displaced comb-teeth over a wide separation, the wireless sensing system exhibits a relatively high resolution (<1 µm) and a large dynamic range (over 7 mm), along with high levels of linearity (R2 > 0.99 over 5 mm) and sensitivity (>12.7 MHz/mm in the 1-3 mm range). The sensor is also shown to be working in the linear region in a scenario where it is attached to a standard structural reinforcing bar. Because of its wireless and passive nature, together with its low cost, the proposed system enabled by the metamaterial probes holds a great promise for applications in remote structural health monitoring.

Optical antenna of comb-shaped split ring architecture for increased field localization in NIR and MIR.

We propose and demonstrate novel designs of optical antennas based on comb-shaped split ring architecture that display multi resonance field intensity enhancement spectrum. These nanoantennas achieve substantially increased field localization at longer wavelengths than that of a single or an array of dipoles with the same side length. With these optical antennas, localizing near infrared (NIR) and mid infrared (MIR) lights within a region of tens of nanometers at an intensity enhancement level of the order of thousands of magnitude can be accomplished.

Three-dimensional study of planar optical antennas made of split-ring architecture outperforming dipole antennas for increased field localization.

Optical antennas are of fundamental importance for the strongly localizing field beyond the diffraction limit. We report that planar optical antennas made of split-ring architecture are numerically found in three-dimensional simulations to outperform dipole antennas for the enhancement of localized field intensity inside their gap regions. The computational results (finite-difference time-domain) indicate that the resulting field localization, which is of the order of many thousandfold, in the case of the split-ring resonators is at least 2 times stronger than the one in the dipole antennas resonant at the same operating wavelength, while the two antenna types feature the same gap size and tip sharpness.

A simple analytical expression for the gradient induced potential on active implants during MRI.

During magnetic resonance imaging, there is an interaction between the time-varying magnetic fields and the active implantable medical devices (AIMD). In this study, in order to express the nature of this interaction, simplified analytical expressions for the electric fields induced by time-varying magnetic fields are derived inside a homogeneous cylindrical volume. With these analytical expressions, the gradient induced potential on the electrodes of the AIMD can be approximately calculated if the position of the lead inside the body is known. By utilizing the fact that gradient coils produce linear magnetic field in a volume of interest, the simplified closed form electric field expressions are defined. Using these simplified expressions, the induced potential on an implant electrode has been computed approximately for various lead positions on a cylindrical phantom and verified by comparing with the measured potentials for these sample conditions. In addition, the validity of the method was tested with isolated frog leg stimulation experiments. As a result, these simplified expressions may help in assessing the gradient-induced stimulation risk to the patients with implants.

Achieving transparency and maximizing scattering with metamaterial-coated conducting cylinders.

In this work, the electromagnetic interaction of plane waves with infinitely long metamaterial-coated conducting cylinders is considered. Different from "conjugate" pairing of double-positive (DPS) and double-negative (DNG) or epsilon-negative (ENG) and mu-negative (MNG) concentric cylinders, achieving transparency and maximizing scattering are separately achieved by covering perfect electric conductor (PEC) cylinders with simple (i.e., homogeneous, isotropic, and linear) metamaterial coatings. The appropriate constitutive parameters of such metamaterials are investigated for Transverse Magnetic (TM) and in particular for Transverse Electric (TE) polarizations. For TE polarization it is found out that the metamaterial-coating permittivity has to be in the 0