Fiber optic ultrasound transmitters and their applications

Ultrasound transmitters are widely used in various applications such as medical imaging and structural health monitoring. Most recently, traditional ultrasound transmitters are challenged by modern applications which require transmitters featuring a broad bandwidth and a compact size. In order to fill the gap, novel ultrasound transmitters, which are built around photoacoustic principle and optical fibers, are developed by various researchers. Photoacoustic principle is an optical ultrasound generation mechanism which involves optical energy absorption and conversion. In this paper, the history of optical ultrasound transmitters based on photoacoustic principle is reviewed and the efficiency of the photoacoustic conversion is discussed. This paper focuses on fiber optic ultrasound transmitters which utilize photoacoustic principle on optical fibers to generate ultrasound. In addition, various applications are discussed in this paper and the unique advantages of fiber optic ultrasound transmitters are covered.