In this paper a theoretical analysis of acoustic microscopy of spheric
al cavities in solids is presented. The incident field of the acoustic
microscope is modeled as a converging acoustic beam of nonplanar wave
front. This beam goes through reflection and transmission at the liqu
id-solid interface. The transmitted beam is scattered by the spherical
cavity in solid. The scattered waves come back to the receiver after
going through another transmission at the liquid-solid interface. Volt
age curves generated by this signal for small as well as large cavitie
s in different materials are analytically synthesized for both horizon
tal and vertical movements of the microscope lens. It is also shown in
this paper how one can obtain the size and location of a cavity from
the acoustic microscope generated voltage curves.