Optical measurements of the self-demodulated displacement and its interpretation in terms of radiation pressure.

Using a sensitive optical interferometer, the low frequency displacement nonlinearly generated by an ultrasonic tone burst propagating in a liquid is studied. Close to the source, the low frequency displacement contains a quasi-static component, which is affected by diffraction effects farther from the transducer. The experimental setup provides quantitative results, which allow the determination of the nonlinearity parameter of the liquid with a good accuracy. Such measurements are carried out in water and ethanol. Finally, the pressure associated with the low frequency displacement is discussed. Introducing the temporal mean value of the displacement, as already done in lossless solids, the noncumulative part of this second order pressure is associated with the static part of the low frequency displacement. This interpretation leads to extend the definition of the Rayleigh radiation pressure usually introduced for a continuous plane wave radiated in a confined fluid.