High-precision array element localization for vertical line arraysin the Arctic Ocean

Array element localization (AEL) surveys are often required to accurately localize acoustic instruments (transponders or sensors) in the ocean. These are typically based on transmitting or recording acoustic signals from or at a set of well-known positions. A significant limiting factor in many AEL surveys is the uncertainty inherent in these “known” positions. In this paper, an inversion algorithm is developed which properly treats both transponder and sensor positions as unknowns, subject to available a priori information in the form of position estimates and uncertainties. The algorithm essentially consists of an iterative linearized inversion of the raytracing equations employing the method of regularization. The approach is applied to independently localize transponders and vertical line array (VLA) sensors that form part of a three-dimensional sensor array in the Arctic Ocean. Confidence limits estimated via Monte Carlo simulation indicate that transponders and sensors are localized to less than 1 m in three dimensions. The VLA sensor motion, monitored over a seven-week period, appears to be predominately driven by tidal currents and is consistent with historical current measurements for the region     

Enhanced estimation of sonobuoy trajectories by velocity reconstruction with near-surface drifters

An investigation to improve trajectory prediction using Lagrangian data is presented. The velocity field of a data assimilating model, EAS-16, is corrected using drifter observations taken during an experiment off Taiwan. The results are tested using another independent Lagrangian data set provided by sonobuoys launched in the same area. The latter have instrument chains that extend well into the water column. Consequently the corrected model velocities were projected into the water column in order to calculate sonobuoy trajectories. The drifter and sonobuoy trajectories both show two distinct regimes in the considered area of approximately 1/2° square. One regime is dominated by shelf dynamics, the other by meandering of the Kuroshio, with a sharp boundary dividing the two. These two regimes are not reproduced by the trajectories of the EAS-16 model. When the drifter data are blended with the model velocities, synthetic sonobuoy trajectories track the observed ones much better, and the two regimes are clearly depicted. Two different methods for the velocity reconstruction are tested. One is based on a variational approach and the other on a normal mode decomposition. Both methods show qualitatively similar improvements in the prediction of sonobuoys trajectories, with a quantitative improvement in the total rms error of approximately 50% and 25%, respectively.     

Benchmarking geoacoustic inversion methods using range-dependent field data

Over the past decade, inversion methods have been developed and applied to acoustic field data to provide information about unknown ocean-bottom environments. An effective inversion must provide both an estimate of the bottom parameters and a measure of the uncertainty of the estimated values. This paper summarizes results from the Office of Naval Research (ONR)/Space and Naval Warfare Systems Command (SPAWAR) Geoacoustic Inversion Techniques Workshop, test cases 4 and 5. The workshop was held to benchmark present-day inversion methods for estimating geoacoustic profiles in shallow water. The format of the workshop was a blind test to estimate unknown geoacoustic profiles by inversion of measured acoustic transmission loss data in octave bands and reverberation envelopes. The data sets for test cases 4 and 5 were taken at two locations in shallow water, one in the East China Sea and the other along the southwest coast of Florida. The limitations of the data and the limits to the knowledge of the sites are discussed. In both cases, impulsive sources were used in conjunction with air-deployed sonobuoys. Since the measured data was incoherent, only methods consistent with total energy matching were applicable. Comparisons between the different inversion techniques presented at the workshop are discussed. For test cases 4 and 5, a precise metric was unavailable for comparison.     

Accurate Modelling of Sonobuoy Refraction Data to Determine Velocity Variations in Oceanic Crust

Modern disposable sonobuoys can provide a simple and cost-effective alternative to ocean bottom seismometers for marine refraction experiments over oceanic crust. Unfortunately, the fact that they are free to drift with the prevailing ocean currents can introduce significant travel-time errors into the modelling process if the seafloor topography is large. For sonobuoys recorded during and after turns the drift rate and direction can be uniquely determined by inversion of the shot-receiver ranges derived from the water-wave arrival. The same method can be used to determine a best fitting average drift vector for the whole dataset. A modification to conventional two-dimensional travel-time modelling techniques has been developed to account for this drift. Each sonobuoy profile is divided into several subsets, typically of 100 shots each, and each subset is then modelled as a separate common receiver gather, significantly reducing the errors in the calculated travel-times. For re alistic bathymetry, the magnitude of these travel-time errors is up to 200 ms, significantly larger than the estimated picking uncertainty. Real data from a typical sonobuoy refraction experiment on the Mid-Atlantic Ridge were modelled with and without the drift correction applied. Much of the lateral variation in the velocity structure was removed when the drift correction was applied, indicating that this structure was due to variations in the travel-times caused by sonobuoy drift.     

Constraining Navigation by Matching Swath Bathymetry and Gravity Measurements at Ship Track Crossovers

A method which utilizes the lateral offset information obtained by comparing swath bathymetric data at track crossover points as a further constraint on the navigation is presented. The method, based on generalized least squares inversion theory, derives a new navigational solution that minimizes the overall misfit between the pairs of topography at crossovers while trying to remain smooth and close to the starting model. To achieve a high numerical efficiency during inversions of large matrices, we employed sparse matrix algorithms. The inversion scheme was applied to a set of Sea Beam data collected over the East Pacific Rise near 9° 30' N in early 1988 at the time when the Global Positioning System had limited coverage. The starting model was constructed by taking evenly spaced samples of positions along the tracklines. For each one of the 361 crossovers, we gridded the bathymetric data around the crossover point compared the gridded maps, and calculated the offset and uncertainty associated with this estimation. A suite of inversion solutions were obtained depending on the choice of three free parameters (that is, the a priori model variance, the correlation interval of a priori model, and the trade-off coefficient between fitting the data and remaining close to the a priori model). The best solution was chosen as one that minimizes both the Sea Beam topography and free-air gravity anomaly differences at crossovers. The improvement was significant; the initial rms mismatch between the tracks and free-air gravity anomalies at crossovers was reduced from 610m to 75m and from 2.5mGal to 1.9mGal, respectively.     

Constraining Navigation by Matching Swath Bathymetry and Gravity Measurements at Ship Track Crossovers

A method which utilizes the lateral offset information obtained by comparing swath bathymetric data at track crossover points as a further constraint on the navigation is presented. The method, based on generalized least squares inversion theory, derives a new navigational solution that minimizes the overall misfit between the pairs of topography at crossovers while trying to remain smooth and close to the starting model. To achieve a high numerical efficiency during inversions of large matrices, we employed sparse matrix algorithms. The inversion scheme was applied to a set of Sea Beam data collected over the East Pacific Rise near 9° 30' N in early 1988 at the time when the Global Positioning System had limited coverage. The starting model was constructed by taking evenly spaced samples of positions along the tracklines. For each one of the 361 crossovers, we gridded the bathymetric data around the crossover point compared the gridded maps, and calculated the offset and uncertainty associated with this estimation. A suite of inversion solutions were obtained depending on the choice of three free parameters (that is, the a priori model variance, the correlation interval of a priori model, and the trade-off coefficient between fitting the data and remaining close to the a priori model). The best solution was chosen as one that minimizes both the Sea Beam topography and free-air gravity anomaly differences at crossovers. The improvement was significant; the initial rms mismatch between the tracks and free-air gravity anomalies at crossovers was reduced from 610m to 75m and from 2.5mGal to 1.9mGal, respectively.     

Effects of Korean littoral environment on acoustic propagation

Environmental acoustics experiments were recently conducted in shallow to intermediate water depths in the Sea of Japan, east of Korea, along the shelf and slope, covering frequencies from 25 to 800 Hz. These were operational experiments carried out in three different seasons. The primary objectives of the data reported here are: (1) to characterize the Korean coastal environment during May 1998, September 1998, and February 1999 and (2) to assess how complexities of the environment might impact acoustic propagation in May and February, as measured by its transmission loss. Propagation data were obtained from broadband explosive SUS sources and sonobuoy receivers. The tests were conducted over varying bottom depths and slopes, both approximately normal and parallel to the bathymetric contours. Two different source depths were included. Environmental and acoustic data are reviewed and discussed. While many aspects of the observed propagation remain ill understood, on the whole a consistent and useful picture has emerged of acoustic propagation in this region. Environmental impacts on propagation are associated mainly with bottom properties, somewhat less so with source depth in relationship to sound speed profiles, and almost not at all with range-dependent profiles of a water mass front     

Using overlapping sonobuoy data from the Ross Sea to construct a 2D deep crustal velocity model

Sonobuoys provide an alternative to using long streamers while conducting multi-channel seismic (MCS) studies, in order to provide deeper velocity control. We present analysis and modeling techniques for interpreting the sonobuoy data and illustrate the method with ten overlapping sonobuoys collected in the Ross Sea, offshore from Antarctica. We demonstrate the importance of using the MCS data to correct for ocean currents and changes in ship navigation, which is required before using standard methods for obtaining a 1D velocity profile from each sonobuoy. We verify our 1D velocity models using acoustic finite-difference (FD) modeling and by performing depth migration on the data, and demonstrate the usefulness of FD modeling for tying interval velocities to the shallow crust imaged using MCS data. Finally, we show how overlapping sonobuoys along an MCS line can be used to construct a 2D velocity model of the crust. The velocity model reveals a thin crust (5.5 ± 0.4 km) at the boundary between the Adare and Northern Basins, and implies that the crustal structure of the Northern Basin may be more similar to that of the oceanic crust in the Adare Basin than to the stretched continental crust further south in the Ross Sea.     

An environmental assessment in the Strait of Sicily: measurementand analysis techniques for determining bottom and oceanographicproperties

In October 1997, the EnVerse 97 shallow-water acoustic experiments were jointly conducted by SACLANT Centre, TNO-FEL, and DERA off the coast of Sicily, Italy. The primary goal of the experiments was to determine the sea-bed properties through inversion of acoustic data. Using a towed source, the inversion method is tested at different source/receiver separations in an area with a range-dependent bottom. The sources transmitted over a broadband of frequencies (90-600 Hz) and the signals were measured on a vertical array of hydrophones. The acoustic data were continuously collected as the range between the source and receiving array varied from 0.5 to 6 km. An extensive seismic survey was conducted along the track providing supporting information about the layered structure of the bottom as well as layer compressional sound speeds. The oceanic conditions were assessed using current meters, satellite remote sensing, wave height measurements, and casts for determining conductivity and temperature as a function of water depth. Geoacoustic inversion results taken at different source/receiver ranges show sea-bed properties consistent with the range-dependent features observed in the seismic survey data. These results indicate that shallow-water bottom properties may be estimated over large areas using a towed source fixed receiver configuration     

Matched-field processing in a range-dependent shallow waterenvironment in the Northeast Pacific Ocean

This paper describes matched-field processing (MFP) of data collected in shallow water off the western coast of Vancouver Island in the Northeast Pacific Ocean. The data were collected from a vertical line array (VLA) as part of the PACIFIC SHELF trial carried out on the continental shelf and slope during September 1993, sensors in the 16-element VLA were evenly spaced at depths between 90 and 315 m, while the sound source was towed along radial paths or arcs. In this paper, we present results of the analysis of data from a continuous wave (CW) source which was towed downslope at a depth of 30 m in water from 150 to 375 m deep, in order to model the range-dependence of the acoustic propagation efficiently, the replica fields were calculated using the adiabatic normal mode approximation. This approximation was considered appropriate for the bottom slopes of the environment. Using sparse bathymetric data, a water sound speed profile and estimates of bottom properties, MFP correlations on individual ambiguity surfaces were found to be greater than 0.9 for the strongest signals. On account of environmental mismatch, the source position could not be determined unambiguously from most of the ambiguity surfaces even at high signal-to-noise ratios. Nevertheless, when an efficient linear tracker was applied to the ambiguity surfaces to find tracks, the source track was recovered at both low and high signal-to-noise ratios, this tracker performs the analysis at a constant depth and reports the track with the highest estimated track signal-to-noise ratio     

Geoacoustic Inversions of Horizontal and Vertical Line Array Acoustic Data From a Surface Ship Source of Opportunity

The application of an inversion methodology produces the first demonstration of a simultaneous solution for geoacoustic and source track parameters from acoustic data collected in a shallow-water, sandy sediment environment. Inversion solutions from data collected in the 2006 Shallow Water Experiment (SW06) are extracted from noise measurements of a surface ship source on an L-array. The methodology includes a screening algorithm to determine a set of frequencies for the inversion data. In addition, the methodology assesses the accuracy of the inversion solution and incorporates an estimation of parameter value uncertainties. The solution from the inversion of the horizontal component of the L-array data from the surface ship source before its closest point of approach (CPA) is used to construct modeled propagation loss for comparison with observed received level (RL) structure as the source departs from CPA. Inversion of the data from a single element in the vertical component of the L-array produces a solution that agrees with the solution obtained from the inversion of horizontal subaperture data. Also, modeled transmission loss (TL) structure obtained from the single-element inversion solution reproduces the depth dependence of the RL structure observed at other elements of the vertical component of the L-array.      

Inversion of Lloyd Mirror Field for Determining a Source's Track

This paper describes a simple approach for inferring the depth and track of a sound source at short ranges by inversion of acoustic field data at a set of sea bottom hydrophones. At short ranges, the acoustic field consists of a dominant Lloyd mirror (LM) signal from the direct and surface-reflected ray paths and a series of bottom-reflected paths that modulate the LM signal. A computationally efficient propagation model based on the method of images is developed to calculate replica fields for the inversion. The matched field inversion method for inferring the source depth and track is demonstrated using data from an experiment carried out in shallow water off the east coast of Canada. The estimated values were in very good agreement with independent measurements taken during the experiment.     

First measurements from a deep-tow transient electromagnetic sounding system

An electromagnetic sounding system has been developed to map the shallow electrical conductivity structure of the deep sea floor. The instrument consists of a magnetic source and several colinear magnetic receivers forming an array which is towed along the seafloor. The source generates a time varying magnetic field; the shape of the resulting magnetic field waveform at the receivers depends on the electrical conductivity below the seafloor between the receivers and the source. The instrument can be towed systematically over a study area under acoustic transponder or GPS navigation to construct a map of the electrical conductivity. Towing speeds of greater than 1 m s^–1 (2 knots) can be achieved without adversely effecting data quality. The instrument is sufficiently robust to survive continual contact with thinly sedimented, abrasive basalt. We present the first results from a deployment in August, 1990 near the Cleft Segment of the Juan de Fuca Ridge along an 8 km track to the west of the spreading center. Unforeseen problems with the instrument restricted the utility of the measurements for constructing detailed vertical conductivity profiles, but the measurements were adequate to determine an average conductivity in the upper 25 m, at more than 70 stations. The conductivity was found to vary from 0.1 to 0.4 S/m along the track.     

Estimating geoacoustic parameters using matched-field inversion methods

In this paper, we use matched-field inversion methods to estimate the geoacoustic parameters for three synthetic test cases from the Geoacoustic Inversion Techniques Workshop held in May 2001 in Gulfport, MS. The objective of this work is to use a sparse acoustic data set to obtain estimates of the parameters as well as an indication of their uncertainties. The unknown parameters include the geoacoustic properties of the sea bed (i.e., number of layers, layer thickness, density, compressional speed, and attenuation) and the bathymetry for simplified range-dependent acoustic environments. The acoustic data used to solve the problems are restricted to five frequencies for a single vertical line array of receivers located at one range from the source. Matched-field inversion using simplex simulated annealing optimization is initially used to find a maximum-likelihood (ML) estimate. However, the ML estimate provides no information on the uncertainties or covariance associated with the model parameters. To estimate uncertainties, a Bayesian formulation of matched-field inversion is used to generate posterior probability density distributions for the parameters. The mean, covariance, and marginal distributions are determined using a Gibbs importance sampler based on the cascaded Metropolis algorithm. In most cases, excellent results were obtained for relatively sensitive parameters such as wave speed, layer thickness, and water depth. The variance of the estimates increase for relatively insensitive parameters such as density and wave attenuation, especially when noise is added to the data.     

Modification and deployment techniques for hand-deployed Arcticlong-life sonobuoys

Specific methods and equipment used to modify, power, and hand-deploy AN/SSQ-57A sonobuoys in the Arctic are discussed. The methods and suggestions can be easily extended for use with other types of sonobuoys. The modified sonobuoys transmit continuously for up to 30 days from a remote unmanned site to a manned base camp over a range of 20 km. Sample acoustic data from the ALPIS 87 ice station are presented     

胶州湾流速场的声层析反演研究

采用结合匹配法和经验正交函数法的射线声层析反演方法,针对流场水平分布不均匀特点,使用距离等效分段方法对反演算法进行改进,利用三个断面声层析数据,对胶州湾口潮流场的垂直和水平分布进行反演。与传统方法比较,大大降低与实测流速垂直分布间的偏差,平均偏差小于0.02 m/s,流场垂直分布间的相关系数提高到0.85以上。分析了声传播断面上不同的流场结构,以及涨潮期间在胶州湾团岛附近出现的涡流现象,并计算得到湾口海水流量变化。结果表明,改进的射线声层析反演方法可有效地用于水平分布不均匀流场监测,仅采用少量声学观测站位,即可获得大范围的复杂流场三维信息,有利于近海海洋资源开发、海洋环境保护和船舶航行安全。     

Multiple-source localization using GPS technology and receivedarrival time structure analysis in an air-deployed system

An efficient and robust method has been developed to locate multiple impulsive sources in an ocean environment. Global position system (GPS) receivers were installed on sonobuoys to obtain their locations within a few meters of accuracy. A sonobuoy field was deployed in a ring-type pattern. Charges were then set off at arbitrary locations within the ring, High-resolution plots were used to obtain direct path and/or first bottom bounce arrivals on each buoy. A model grid of arrival times was constructed, corresponding to the dimensions of the buoy field. A ray model previously developed here at the Applied Research Laboratories at the University of Texas at Austin (ARL:UT) was used to obtain model travel times. The minimum value of the least-square-type error between the real arrival times and the modeled travel times resulted in an unambiguous location of the source, within the limits of the grid spacing chosen. This value was calculated by picking one receiver as the reference and then summing the timing errors of the remaining receivers relative to the reference. Successive iterations with finer grid spacings result in source localization within the accuracy of the buoy locations. The localization routine was extended by allowing permutations of the pulse arrivals on each buoy to account for multiple sources closely separated in time and/or space. An automated correlation technique is presented as an alternative to the leading edge-detection method used here for obtaining relative arrival times. Two proof-of-concept experiments were performed and some results of data obtained at Lake Travis and the Gulf of Mexico are presented     

Acoustic inversion of bottom reflectivity and bottom sound-speedprofile

This paper applies a full-field technique to invert bottom sound profile and bottom reflectivity from simulated acoustic data in a shallow water environment. Bottom sound-speed profile and bottom reflectivity have been traditionally estimated using seismic reflection/refraction techniques when acoustic ray paths and travel time can be identified and measured from the data. However, in shallow water, the many multipaths due to bottom reflection/refraction make such identification and measurement rather difficult. A full-field inversion technique is presented here that uses a broad-band source and a vertical array for bottom sound-speed and reflectivity inversion. The technique is a modified matched field inversion technique referred to as matched beam processing. Matched beam processing uses conventional beamforming processing to transform the field data into the beam domain and correlate that with the replica field also in the beam domain. This allows the analysis to track the acoustic field as a function of incident/reflected angle and minimize contamination or mismatch due to sidelobe leakage     

海洋中尺度涡建模及其在水声传播影响研究中的应用

针对海洋中尺度涡对水声传播的影响,利用中尺度涡区的历史水文实测数据提取涡旋强度,空间尺度等中尺度涡特征参数,建立了海洋中尺度涡理论计算模型。运用MMPE水下声场模型仿真试验研究了涡旋性质、强度和位置、声源频率和置放深度对声传播特性的影响。结果表明：暖涡使得会聚区的位置“后退”,会聚区宽度增加;冷涡使得会聚区的位置“前移”,会聚区宽度减小。涡旋的强度越大,“前移”或“回退”的效应越显著。     

Source localization with broad-band matched-field processing inshallow water

Acoustic source localization using matched-field processing is presented for multitone signals from the Shallow Water Evaluation cell Experiment 3 (SWellEX-3). The experiment was carried out in July 1994 west of Point Loma, CA, in 200 m of water of complex bathymetry. The multitone signal (ten tones between 50 and 200 Hz) was transmitted from an acoustic source towed at various depths over tracks which produced complex propagation paths to a vertical line array receiver. Broad-band and narrow-hand processing, localization, and tracking results are compared with each other and with independent estimates of source position. With narrow-band processing, mismatch between the data and the predicted signal replica of ~1 dB reduced the mainlobe to levels equal to or below the sidelobes. Incoherently averaging the processing output over the multiple tones reduced range/depth sidelobe levels, allowing accurate source localization and tracking