Layered Oceanic Microstructure, Its Effects on Sound Propagation

Abstract

It has recently been established that the vertical profiles of oceanographic parameters in the seasonal and permanent thermocline regions are not the smooth cruves observed by older techniques. Rather they indicate a large number of nearly homogeneous layers, with typical thicknesses of metres or less, separated by interfacial regions where strong gradients exist. Examples of typical layered microstructure profiles from different ocean areas are presented. The effects of such microstructure on sound propagation are examined qualitatively using ray tracing techniques. It was found that the layered microstructure had a significant effect only when rays vertex within the layers; in which case the iso-intensity-loss contours degenerate into a broad scatter of points.

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Document Details

Document Type
Technical Report
Publication Date
Feb 01, 1972
Accession Number
AD0740052

Entities

People

  • Leonard E. Mellberg
  • Ola M. Johannessen

Organizations

  • SACLANT ASW Research Centre

Tags

Communities of Interest

  • Energy and Power Technologies
  • Materials and Manufacturing Processes
  • Sensors

DTIC Thesaurus Topics

  • Abstracts
  • Acoustic Propagation
  • Arctic Ocean
  • Defense Planning
  • Governments
  • Intensity
  • Internal Waves
  • Losses
  • Measurement
  • Microstructure
  • Nato
  • Oceans
  • Ray Tracing
  • Regions
  • Temperature Gradients
  • Thermoclines
  • Tyrrhenian Sea

Readers

  • Atmospheric Science / Meteorology, specifically Wind Wave Turbulence.
  • Fluid Dynamics.
  • Ocean-Atmosphere Mesoscale Modeling, Data Assimilation, and Flux Boundary Layers