A SWITCHED STATE SOURCE OF OCEAN ACOUSTIC TOMOGRAPHY

THIS PROPOSAL CONCERNS AN ACOUSTIC SOURCE FOR OCEAN ACOUSTIC TOMOGRAPHY. A SWITCHED STATE DESIGN IS PROPOSED. THIS APPROACH HAS NOT YET BEEN REDUCED TO PRACTICE, HOWEVER, THE RESEARCH RISKS MAY BE OFFSET BY THE PROMISE OF EXCELLENT PERFORMANCE IN TOMOGRAPHY APPLICATIONS. A SWITCHED STATE SOURCE COMPARED TO A CONVENTIONAL SOURCE OF THE SMAE BANDWIDTH, FREQUENCY, AND EFFICIENCY WILL BE SMALLER, LIGHTER, LESS EXPENSIVE, AND EASIER TO DEPLOY. THESE GAINS ARE QUITE SIGNIFICANT, AS PRACTICAL CONVENTIONAL SOURCES WILL BE IN THE $100-300K RANGE. THE PERFORMANCE GAIN CAN BE CONSIDERED AS A RESULT OF RADIATING ONLY THE SPECIFIC PHASE AND/OR FREQUENCY ENCODED SIGNAL REQUIRED FOR THE TOMOGRAPHIC EXPERIMENT. A CONVENTIONAL SOURCE CAN TRANSMIT ANY CODE, AND THIS UNIVERSALITY REQUIRES THAT IT BE LARGER THAN A SWITCHED STATE SOURCE. THE RESEARCH APPROACH PROPOSED INCLUDES THE DESIGN, CONSTRUCTION AND TESTS OF A PROTOTYPE TRANSDUCER, AND PRELIMINARY DESIGN OF A PHASE II SOURCE.