Acoustic levitation of a rigid nano-sphere at non-continuum conditions

We study the steady force acting on a rigid spherical particle immersed in an ideal gas and impinged by a standing acoustic wave. The acoustic wavelength and particle radius are assumed much larger and smaller, respectively, than the molecular mean-free path. To analyse the system, an asymptotic scheme is constructed, combining an inviscid continuum description in the far field with a free-molecular formulation for the near gas–surface interaction. The computation yields a closed-form expression for the steady acoustic force. The free-molecular solution is compared with a formerly derived result in the continuum regime (Doinkov, Proc. R. Soc. Lond. A, vol. 447, 1994, pp. 447–466), and the latter is found characteristically larger by an order of magnitude at a given ratio between the particle radius and the acoustic wavelength. Markedly, the size of the acoustic force at ballistic flow conditions may become up to four orders of magnitude larger than the typical gravitational force, suggesting the feasibility of nano-particle acoustic levitation.