Range-dependent geoacoustic inversion of vertical line array data using matched beam processing

Abstract

This paper describes the results of range-dependent geoacoustic inversion using vertical line array data obtained from the 4th Matched Acoustic Properties and Localization Experiment conducted in the East Sea of Korea. The narrowband multitone continuous-wave signal from the towed source was analyzed to estimate the range-dependent geoacoustic properties along the radial track. The primary approach is based on the sectorwise inversion scheme. The inversion region up to 7.5 km from the vertical line array was divided into several segments, and the subinversions for each segment were performed sequentially. To reduce the dominance of low-angle arrivals, which bears little information for the bottom segment in question, matched beam processing with beam filtering was used for the cost function. The performance of proposed algorithm was tested using simulated data for an environment representative of the experimental site. The inversion results for the experimental data were consistent with the geophysical database and were validated from matched-field source localization using frequencies different from those used in the inversion. (C) 2009 Acoustical Society of America. [DOI: 10.1121/1.3056551]