Underwater Acoustic Imaging

Context

In this scenario, we aim at the acquisition of an image of the underwater seabed, from the exploitation of an active sonar device.

ECHANGE contribution

A set of piezoelectrical cells emit some signals which are partially reected by the seabed, depending on its position and nature (texture, material). These reections are then recorded by hydrophones (microphones designed for water sound propagation) and an image of the seabed is reconstructed.
State-of-the-art

In traditional underwater acoustic imaging, the ocean is scanned slice by slice (beamforming) by means of a so-called \multibeam echosonder". This technique raises several issues: the 3D structure of the seabed across beams is not exploited; the acquisition is costful in terms of time and dataow. Our aim in the ECHANGE underwater imaging scenario is to investigate on the potential of sparse models and reconstruction to be a worthy alternative to multibeam echosonder, either by reducing the dataflow and/or time of acquisition, or by improving of the final image resolution.

More details

To come...