Continuing development of phased array Doppler sonar systems
Abstract
Novel acoustic Doppler sensing techniques are an integral part of improved observational and eventually predictive capability of the complex dynamical processes that govern upper ocean shear, strain, turbulent dissipation, and sound speed profiles. Work underway i n multiple recent ONR DRIs (ASIRI, SODA, NISKINe, FLEAT, MISO-BoB) has emphasized the role of coherent structures in setting both pa tterns of upper ocean shear/strain, and mediating heat fluxes. Our ability to parameterize such phenomena is largely limited by a pa ucity of observations of the fully three-dimensional nature of relevant dynamics. Those structures include a hierarchy ranging from sub-mesoscale and frontal instabilities with lateral scales of hundreds of meters, through the cascade of breaking internal waves fr om hundreds down to tens of meters horizontally, all the way to three dimensional turbulence with meter and below scales.Here we pro pose continued development and expansion of Phased Array Doppler Sonar capabilities that we have begun with previous DURIP funding. On a vehicle towed sub-surface (behind a ship), the PADS can see synoptic swaths of ocean velocity structure out tens to hundreds of meters laterally (depending on acoustic frequency). A prototype instrument built with previous DURIP support (N00014-18-1-2836) was successfully deployed on the R/V Sproul in March 2021. Here we request funding to take the next steps in phased array development, focusing on i) continued development of embedded chip systems for data processing, ii) expansion of the array size, iii) refinement of tow-body stability, and iv) exploration of novel acoustic sensing materials. The goal is to produce an operational T-PADS system for initial deployment during the 2022 NORSE experiment in the North Atlantic.This abstract is publicly releasable.
Document Details
- Document Type
- DoD Grant Award
- Publication Date
- Oct 22, 2021
- Source ID
- N000142112911
Entities
People
- Jennifer MacKinnon
Organizations
- Office of Naval Research
- United States Navy
- University of California, San Diego