An Analysis of the Water-to-Ice Phase Transition Using Acoustic Plate Waves

It is shown that, in spite of the wave radiation into the adjacent liquid, a large group of Lamb waves are able to propagate along piezoelectric plates (quartz, LiNbO₃, LiTaO₃) coated with a liquid layer (distilled water H₂O). When the layer freezes, most of the group's waves increase their losses, essentially forming an acoustic response towards water-to-ice transformation. Partial contributions to the responses originating from wave propagation, electro-mechanical transduction, and wave scattering were estimated and compared with the coupling constants, and the vertical displacements of the waves were calculated numerically at the water-plate and ice-plate interfaces. The maximum values of the responses (20-30 dB at 10-100 MHz) are attributed to the total water-to-ice transformation. Time variations in the responses at intermediate temperatures were interpreted in terms of a two-phase system containing both water and ice simultaneously. The results of the paper may turn out to be useful for some applications where the control of ice formation is an important problem (aircraft wings, ship bodies, car roads, etc.).