On the interaction of surface water waves and fully-submerged elastic plates

Abstract: The interaction between fully-submerged elastic plates and surface waves is of high interest to optimize wave energy converters such as the "Wave Carpet". This study focuses on the interaction between an elastic plate and waves from an experimental point of view. To do so, a submerged thin elastic plate is held at a fixed position in a wave field. The wave field is analyzed using a top view video recording that gives access to the water height field while the deformation of the elastic plate is recorded with a side view camera. Preliminary results presented in this paper show that the elastic plate transmits most of incoming wave energy while reflecting almost no energy. It is also shown that dissipation arises for wavelengths less than two times the length of the plate. Causes of dissipation are investigated emphasizing that viscous dissipation could be responsible for the loss of energy.