The holy grail of new room treatment technology

We'll all be dead before they perfect this. But the practical aspects - highway sound barriers, etc - are limitless, assuming they can 'print' at a reasonable cost and in larger sizes.
 
The answer is finally here--a computer designed material that perfectly redirects and reflects sound. It also has the advantage of being lightweight and 3d printable. Prepare to be surrounded by black and yellow blocks.

Thin Engineered Material Perfectly Redirects and Reflects Sound | Duke Electrical and Computer Engineering

I love Duke University. Great hospital, great basketball, and great engineering

Why 3 D print it at all ? What is the advantage.

Anyway, I am very skeptical of the claims. More so with the 3D print claim.
 
"While this particular setup was designed to control a sound wave at 3,000 Hertz...the metamaterials could be scaled to affect almost any wavelength of sound."

I would like to see the complete set of these metamaterials, installed...where they would effectively control all the frequencies from 20Hz to 20kHz.
I think when they get down to the low mids, lows, and sub frequencies...they will reach a point of "effective but impractical" reality, if to be used in a typical studio.
 
Why 3 D print it at all ? What is the advantage.

Anyway, I am very skeptical of the claims. More so with the 3D print claim.

For diffusers, at least, this seems like a cost saving measure. Diffusion is incredibly expensive, largely because of the economics involved. According to the distributors who have discussed this issue elsewhere on line, the process is very labor intensive and the market is comparatively small. As a result, the price is high. For the average DIY type, the process is almost laughable. You spend days cutting wood according to some dubious formula, only to drown in glue and sawdust with an end product that weighs a ton.
 
"While this particular setup was designed to control a sound wave at 3,000 Hertz...the metamaterials could be scaled to affect almost any wavelength of sound."

I would like to see the complete set of these metamaterials, installed...where they would effectively control all the frequencies from 20Hz to 20kHz.
I think when they get down to the low mids, lows, and sub frequencies...they will reach a point of "effective but impractical" reality, if to be used in a typical studio.


Like I said, prepare to be surrounded in yellow and black plastic blocks. The end result would probably resemble a giant bee hive complex. Although I'm not clear on what scaling would mean in this circumstance. We assume that low frequencies can only be controlled by very thick materials. If the same applies to this stuff, we're sunk. The other issue to keep in mind is outgassing. Aging plastics? I can't begin to contemplate the environmental impact of these materials. Just because it controls and redirects sound perfectly, doesn't mean that it won't eventually kill you. Says the guy who lives in the middle of an insulation farm.

As for the skeptics of university-based research, advances have to come from somewhere. Apparently, they have data and this sort of thing usually gets a serious peer review, especially if published. Thats more than I can say for most of the acoustics market place which usually rests on a private lab that provides test data. And the history of innovation is replete with examples where new products result from "spinoff" science. This could be the Tang of acoustic materials.
 
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