Galfenol - a Novel Structural Magnetostrictive Alloy

Alison Flatau, Ph.D., P.E.
Aerospace Engineering
3184 Glenn L. Martin Hall
Univ. Maryland
College Park, MD 20742

Magnetostrictive materials belong to the family of smart materials
or active materials that are enabling major advances in noise, vibration and
shape control and new approaches to structural health monitoring.  An
introduction to magnetostrictive materials will be presented, followed by an
emphasis on the new structural magnetostrictive alloy Galfenol with
discussion of current and potential applications that range from nano-and
mems sensors to large scale sonar devices.  A summary of the issues and
problems of transitioning this relatively new alloy (still in the process of being
patented) to commercial scale production and thoughts on taking advantage of
its unique structural attributes (e.g. ductility and a negative Poison's
ratio) will be included in the presentation.

1.      Basic Magnetostriction: Direct and Inverse effects

2.      Material and Device Transduction Equations

3.      Common Magnetostrictive Transducer Design Issues

4.      Galfenol - a novel Structural Magnetostrictive Alloy

5.      Current and Potential Galfenol Applications