Mimicking the active cochlea with a fluid-coupled array of subwavelength Hopf resonators

Abstract

We present a design for an acoustic metamaterial that mimics the behaviour of the active cochlea. This material is composed of a size-graded array of cylindrical subwavelength resonators, has similar dimensions to the cochlea and is able to reproduce the frequency separation of audible frequencies. Non-linear amplification is introduced to the model in order to replicate the behaviour of the cochlear amplifier. This formulation takes the form of a fluid-coupled array of Hopf resonators. We seek solutions based on a modal decomposition, so as to retain the physically-derived coupling between resonators.