Acoustics is an interdisciplinary area of teaching and research. It includes basic acoustical wave theory, ultrasonics, underwater sound, transducers, nonlinear acoustics, noise and noise control, and environmental acoustics. The program remains concentrated in mechanical and electrical engineering, but several other departments, including civil engineering, aerospace engineering & engineering mechanics, petroleum and geosystems engineering, and physics, have faculty and students who participate. Major campus facilities include:
- Acoustics and Transducers Laboratory
- Anechoic Chamber
- Electroacoustics Laboratory
- Reverberation Room
- Ultrasonics Laboratory
In addition, Applied Research Laboratories (ARL), while not an academic unit of the University, provides strong support for acoustics education through its many R&D programs in acoustics. The level of funding for research at ARL is approximately $100M per year, about half of which is devoted to acoustics. Their major facilities include large water tanks for transducer calibration and underwater sound experiments, a transducer fabrication facility, and the Lake Travis Test Station for large scale sonar evaluation. Many graduate students and several faculty from the various departments named, carry out their research at ARL.
Find out about the Applied Research Laboratories McKinney Fellowship in Acoustics, which includes a graduate research assistantship for up to three years.
The university also conducts research and offers courses in other areas of acoustics, outside of engineering and physics, notably in hearing, linguistics, speech communication, animal acoustics, and musical acoustics.
Coursework is offered by Acoustics Area faculty in a wide variety of topics pertinent to Acoustics. These courses are categorized as Undergraduate Courses and Graduate Courses. In addition to these courses, there are a number of Related Graduate Courses offered within other areas of the Department of Mechanical Engineering and through other departments. Courses not listed on this page may also be acceptable in a program of study. All courses must be approved by the student's thesis/dissertation supervisor, thesis/dissertation committee, and the chair of the graduate studies committee.
Acoustics Area Graduate Courses
The following are courses regularly offered by faculty within the Acoustics Area and may be used in a program of graduate study for Acoustics Area students of Mechanical Engineering. Topics 1-3 are offered every year, and Topics 4-8 are offered every other year. Please check the Official UT Online Course Schedule to determine when a particular course if offered.
Acoustics
- ME 384N / EE 384N Topic 1: Acoustics I
- ME 384N / EE 384N Topic 2: Acoustics II
- ME 384N / EE 384N Topic 3: Electromechanical Transducers
- ME 384N / EE 384N Topic 4: Nonlinear Acoustics
- ME 384N / EE 384N Topic 5: Underwater Acoustics
- ME 384N / EE 384N Topic 6: Architectural Acoustics
- ME 384N / EE 384N Topic 7: Ultrasonics
- ME 384N / EE 384N Topic 8: Wave Phenomena
- ME 384N / EE 384N Topic 9: Acoustic Metamaterials
Acoustics Area Related Graduate Courses
Additional information about acoustics-related courses within the ME department and across campus are listed on Courses on the Texas Acoustics site. Please check the Online Course Scheduleand the Online Graduate Catalogfrom the Office of the Registrarto find additional courses which may be of interest.
VISIT THE TEXAS ACOUSTICS WEBSITE
