Fractal reconstruction of sea-floor topography

Sea-floor bathymetric profiles exhibit features at many different scales of length; this suggests that they could be described as fractals. An algorithm interpolating a fractal line between points has been used to reconstruct bathymetric profiles from a few data points. In general, this fractal line has the same Fourier amplitude spectrum as real bathymetry, and, if the parameters of the interpolation are suitably chosen, it has a very similar appearance. The success of this fractal reconstruction algorithm for the sea-floor raises the possibility that it could be used to extrapolate, from data collected at one scale, the properties of the sea-floor at finer scales, and that similar techniques could be used to interpolate a surface between bathymetric profiles. The fractal character is a sign that the processes that shape the sea-floor are scale invariant and suggests that the renormalization group technique could be used to model these processes.