  Chiral phononic crystals provide unique properties not offered by
conventional phononic material based on Bragg scattering and local resonance.
However, it is insufficient to only consider the inertial amplification effect
in chiral phononic crystals. Here, we theoretically and experimentally
introduce the analogy with Thomson scattering to characterize the bandgap
phenomena in chiral phononic crystals. Two phononic structures are proposed and
discussed, one with translationrotation coupling and another with
translation-translation coupling. The two lattices are different in appearance
but have similar bandgaps. Thomson scattering in electromagnetic waves was
drawn on to describe the coupling motion of the unit cells. We evidence that
the bandgap generation is essentially based on the analogous Thomson scattering
aiming to achieve an anti-phase superposition of the waves in the same
polarization mode. This finding sheds new light on the physics of the
elastodynamic wave manipulation in chiral phononic crystals and opens a
remarkable route for their pragmatic implementation.
