Is the field of Acoustics promising?

[Metro21]

Good afternoon.

Acoustics is one of the oldest branches of physics. The first, let's say, works in this field were even BCE (if I'm not mistaken). But how relevant is it today? And how relevant will it be in the future?

On the example of my university, in which there is a direction dealing with acoustics (and mainly hydroacoustics (sometimes turning into pure hydrodynamics, which worries me)), it is not quite clear the prospects of this direction of scientific research. Especially when in our time are engaged in all sorts of quantum physics, lasers, nuclear physics, etc., against the background of which the acoustics do not look so impressive. If anyone knows about this direction of physics, what developments or scientific research in the field of Acoustics can be very promising (both in terms of scientific developments or engineering tasks, and in more career or monetary terms), which can find their place today and in the future?

 

[pines-demon]

Good afternoon.

Acoustics is one of the oldest branches of physics. The first, let's say, works in this field were even BCE (if I'm not mistaken). But how relevant is it today? And how relevant will it be in the future?

On the example of my university, in which there is a direction dealing with acoustics (and mainly hydroacoustics (sometimes turning into pure hydrodynamics, which worries me)), it is not quite clear the prospects of this direction of scientific research. Especially when in our time are engaged in all sorts of quantum physics, lasers, nuclear physics, etc., against the background of which the acoustics do not look so impressive. If anyone knows about this direction of physics, what developments or scientific research in the field of Acoustics can be very promising (both in terms of scientific developments or engineering tasks, and in more career or monetary terms), which can find their place today and in the future?

Acoustic problems are always present because there are many industrial applications, to the point it is mostly a concern of engineering. However, there are all kind of modern versions like quantum acoustic systems, nanofluidics and so on. And even in just classical acoustics there are some open problems related to getting better predictions for real nonsimple systems.

Is classical acoustics a hot topic? Definitely not. Is it interesting, probably yes. Is it worth dedicating your studies to it, maybe not, I mean you can study any other more fundamental physics branch and then come back to that if that is what you want.