Here a prime denotes . It is useful to retain terms through in the normal mechanical equilibrium equation, even though only first-order shape corrections are sought. The undeformed elastic membrane is tensionless, so a first-order change of curvature contributes to normal force only at second order.
The geometric equations written in reference arc length are
Their first-order Taylor expansions give
and hence
The principal stretches and the first-order constitutive equation are
Because exactly, the tangential mechanical equilibrium equation gives . Thus both and are spatial constants: .
Expand the geometric factors in the normal balance:
Consequently
Matching the first-order coefficient gives the requested relation
Since the prescribed pressure has no second-order term, and , its second-order coefficient gives
A closed boundary value problem for the three requested unknowns is therefore
The first equation has order two, the second order one, and the last order one, so the four boundary conditions match the total order. The unknown constant is selected by the axial endpoint constraint, rather than by an additional specified traction.
For , an equivalent formulation eliminates and displays that constraint as an integral:
After solving this system, recover by integration from . No second derivatives of the unspecified function are required: they enter the next-order shape corrections through the second-order constitutive equation, whereas the displayed normal balance already determines the leading shape. The case has the undeformed solution .
Take , with time convention , and use the Fourier transform pair , . For an acoustic velocity potential, and . Its harmonic amplitude solves the Helmholtz equation. The outgoing Fourier component has the form
The outgoing acoustic square-root branch is fixed by decay for evanescent components and upward radiation for propagating components:
A precise causal prescription is to replace by , , select for real , invert on the real axis, and take . It corresponds to switching on the forcing from the remote past. The limiting inversion contour passes below the positive outgoing surface-wave pole and above the negative one. The branch points are approached with the same causal prescription; analytic continuation during contour deformation must remain on this sheet. A principal real square root with positive imaginary part inside the acoustic interval would produce incoming sound and the wrong solution.
The elastic membrane's normal velocity equals the fluid velocity at the boundary, so . Consequently
The elastic membrane balance therefore gives
Writing , the one-sided fluid-loaded membrane radiation formulas are
The sign of the fluid term describes positive added mass of an evanescent fluid layer, not negative inertia.
For , the acoustic saddle point is , with . Applying the stated method of steepest descent result gives
Since in amplitude notation, the angular acoustic directivity of the pressure, apart from angle-independent factors, is
The intensity directivity is proportional to . This cylindrical radiating field has amplitude of order . The formula is for fixed interior angles; grazing-angle limits require a separate uniform approximation.
For real , is positive, as , and as . A root exists. A root also requires . In that range,
so the root is unique. Evenness supplies the second root, . There are no real roots inside : the fluid-loading term is real and nonzero while the other term is purely imaginary. Thus there are exactly two real physical-sheet roots, , for nonzero forcing frequency, positive elastic-sheet tension and positive fluid mass density. The zero-frequency static limit is not a two-distinct-root statement.
These roots are counterpropagating evanescent acoustic surface waves coupled to the membrane:
Their normal profiles decay as , and their phase speed is below both and the vacuum membrane speed. They matter for the elastic membrane motion and for observations near its surface, but are not automatically part of the leading far-field radiation. A residue is picked up only when the causal contour deformation crosses its pole; at fixed its magnitude is exponentially small, .
For example, in the right half-plane put , and . The pole is at and the saddle at . The steepest-descent path has . At the pole height its left branch has real coordinate ; comparing it with the original contour just to the right of the pole shows that its residue is crossed for
The analogous sector lies near for the negative pole. This is why the existence of real dispersion zeros alone does not make their residues relevant in every observation direction.
Use the Fourier transform convention . Let , choosing on the real contour with . For time dependence , this is the decaying continuation of the outgoing Sommerfeld radiation condition.
The transformed Helmholtz equation has upper and lower solutions and . The two kinematic traces give , hence
The elastic membrane equation gives . Therefore the acoustic wave on a tensioned massive membrane has dispersion relation
Equivalently, . The fluid on both sides supplies a positive added mass of an evanescent fluid layer, which is a useful independent check on the sign. In particular, the incident pressure is
The symbol here denotes elastic membrane mass per area, rather than the fluctuating Mach number used in Question 1.
Linearity permits subtraction of the incident acoustic membrane wave. The scattered pressure solves the homogeneous Helmholtz equation, and the kinematic relation defines its line displacement on both halves. On , subtracting the incident elastic membrane equation gives the scattered dynamic equation. On , there is no elastic membrane, so the total pressure jump must vanish, giving . The pinned endpoint has , hence , rather than zero.
Use full and Half-range Fourier transforms with the same convention as part (a), and put
Write for the left transform of the upper scattered pressure, for its right transform, and for the corresponding transforms of . Outgoing antisymmetry in implies
The second relation comes from the prescribed pressure cancellation on .
The endpoint terms in the left Fourier transform of are crucial:
Thus . Eliminating gives the Wiener-Hopf equation
There is a defect in the printed right side: with the stated incident exponential, pressure jump, and pinned total displacement, it omits the incident endpoint term and has the opposite sign on the incident-pressure term. The displayed corrected equation follows directly from both boundary traces. The given right side cannot be derived with these definitions. Using , an especially useful equivalent form is
The correction is necessary for the reconstructed pressure to satisfy the original physical boundary conditions.
For Wiener-Hopf factorization, take with the plus factor analytic and nonzero in the upper half-plane and the minus factor analytic and nonzero in the lower half-plane. Singularities listed next refer to continuation out of each factor's own analytic half-plane. Let , so and lies below the real axis. Generically inherits the pole at and the square-root branch point at , while inherits the pole at and the branch point at . The kernel is finite but nonanalytic at the acoustic branch points: its local behavior is a constant plus a square-root term, not an inverse-square-root divergence. Coincident branch points and poles require a limiting treatment.
Zeros of are the fluid-loaded dispersion relation roots. Lower-half-plane roots, including the incoming guided root , belong to the continued ; upper-half-plane roots, including the reflected root for the even kernel, belong to the continued . The roots represent membrane-guided modes; the branch cuts represent radiated acoustic waves. Only roots on the selected outgoing sheet are included, not spurious roots created by squaring the dispersion relation. No explicit factorization is required.
Here is an explicit solution in terms of those factors. Define
The pole of at has residue ; the pole at is canceled by the pole of . Thus have the required respective analyticity. Divide the corrected Wiener-Hopf equation by and split its right side as , where
The difference quotient in is removable at and is analytic below. Moving the plus and minus terms to opposite sides yields the common entire function. With the assumed , the solution is
Combining with the known gives the full scattered pressure transform
The requested pressure integral, for , is consequently
The real contour uses the causal continuation ; its undamped limit retains the induced pole and branch-cut prescriptions. The residue theorem shows that upper-half-plane zeros of yield left-going scattered elastic membrane modes. On the right, the lower incident-pole residue of the scattered integral cancels at the open line, as required.
Finally reconstruct the left scattered displacement:
For a generic unspecified , this has a lower-half-plane pole at the bare elastic membrane wavenumber . Such a pole is incompatible with analyticity of an outgoing left-supported scattered displacement: it would represent an additional right-going incoming elastic membrane contribution. It must be removed. Its residue is , so the incoming-pole cancellation at a pinned membrane edge condition is
Since is linear in , this fixes the endpoint slope generically. Explicitly it is
The physical lower incident pole of the total displacement is already prescribed by ; it must not be confused with this removable spurious pole of the scattered field.
For a fixed circular elastic membrane, the Rayleigh-Ritz variational principle applied to , , gives . The numerator of its Rayleigh quotient is , and the denominator is . Minimization gives , , and the displayed upper bound for the ordinary frequency . Every has finite radial Dirichlet energy, which is the required variational admissibility condition.
Radial vibrations of a circular membrane Created 2026-10-18 Updated 2026-10-20
A fixed circular elastic membrane of radius has radial normal modes satisfying the displayed Sturm-Liouville problem, with weight , and regularity at the origin. The regular solutions are Bessel functions of the first kind . Integration by parts gives the positive Rayleigh quotient . Distinct modes are orthogonal in the weighted inner product .