Negative Effective Density in An Acoustic Metamaterial

We report theoretical and experimental results for a new type of homogenized acoustic metamaterials with negative effective mass density. We constructed one-dimensional metamaterial, which is a tube with an array of very thin elastic membranes placed inside. This structure exhibited negative effective density in the frequency range from 0 to 735 Hz. The experimental result is in excellent agreement with our theoretical model that predicts negative effective density below a cut-off frequency. The frequency characteristics of this effective density is analogous to that of the permittivity of the electromagnetic plasma oscillation.