Wake penetrating sonar

Leighton, Timothy G., Finfer, Daniel C., White, Paul R., Chua, Gim Hwa and Dix, Justin K. (2010) Wake penetrating sonar. 1st EAA Congress on Sound and Vibration (EuroRegio 2010), Ljubljana, Slovenia. 15 - 18 Sep 2010. 8 pp .

Abstract

This paper describes a sonar which can operate in bubbly water. It is here deployed to penetrate the wake of a ship of 3,953 gross register tonnage. Orthodox Cold War sonar technology is not optimized for the shallow coastal waters that typify many current operations. The United States use dolphins in such waters, and the Twin Inverted Pulse Sonar (TWIPS) described here arose as a demonstration that echolocation was possible in bubbly water in response to a video showing dolphins generating bubble nets when hunting: if echolocation were impossible in these nets, then during this hunt the dolphins would have compromised their sonar. In this paper TWIPS detects and classifies targets against clutter by distinguishing between linear and nonlinear scatterer. For other applications, it has the potential to distinguish those nonlinear targets which scatter energy at the even-powered harmonics from those which scatter in the odd-powered harmonics. TWIPS can also, in some manifestations, require no range correction (and therefore does not require the a priori environment knowledge necessary for many remote detection technologies). The method applies to a range of sensors, including the use of radar to distinguish between circuitry, metal and soil; the use of LIDAR to detect combustion products; and MRI.

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Contributors

Author: Timothy G. Leighton

Author: Paul R. White

Author: Justin K. Dix

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