Studies of Ocean Volume Reverberation at High Acoustic Frequencies

• Main Author: Holliday, D. V.
• Other Authors: TRACOR APPLIED SCIENCES INC SAN DIEGO CA
• Format: Text
• Language: English
• Published: 1991
• Subjects: Biological Oceanography; Acoustic Detection and Detectors; Acoustics; *FREQUENCY; SCATTERING; HIGH FREQUENCY; COASTAL REGIONS; OCEAN CURRENTS; CORES; REAL TIME; DISTRIBUTION; CHEMICALS; CHEMISTRY; CONTINENTAL SLOPES; CALIFORNIA; TRANSITIONS; NORTH(DIRECTION); OCEANS; RESEARCH MANAGEMENT; RANGE(EXTREMES); REVERBERATION; SEA WATER; OCEAN ENVIRONMENTS; GULF STREAM; NORTH ATLANTIC OCEAN; UNDERWATER SOUND; ECOLOGY; OCEANOGRAPHERS; AUDIO FREQUENCY; ZOOPLANKTON; VOLUME; *ZOOPLANKTON; *ACOUSTIC MEASUREMENT; *REVERBERATION; *SEAWATER; ACOUSTIC SCATTERING; SIZES(DIMENSIONS); MAPS(MULTIFREQUENCY ACOUSTIC PROFILING SYSTEM); WATER CHEMISTRY; VOLUME REVERBERATION; DISCRIMINATION; NEKTON; LPN-TRACOR-107-053; LPN-TRACOR-034-020; TEMPORAL DISTRIBUTION; TIME SPATIAL DISTRIBUTION; SIZE DISTRIBUTION; North Atlantic
• Online Access: http://www.dtic.mil/docs/citations/ADA242719; http://oai.dtic.mil/oai/oai?&verb=getRecord&metadataPrefix=html&identifier=ADA242719

The principal goal of this research was to improve the ability of oceanographers to quantitatively measure small-to-intermediate scale spatial and temporal distributions of marine zooplankton, with size discrimination, in relation to the distribution of physical and chemical features in the ocean environment. The research resulted in the development of an new technology based on the scattering of high frequency underwater sound at multiple frequencies from zooplankton and micronekton. The technology allows one to examine distributions of small zooplankton, by size, in relation to ocean physics and chemistry, in situ and essentially in real time. The most sophisticated implementation of this technology is the Multi-frequency Acoustic Profiling System (MAPS). During the course of this work, it was used numerous research programs that were focused on different aspects of the ecology of marine zooplankton. It was used in support of programs, in a wide range of ocean environment, including the California Current, the Coastal Transition Zone (off northern California), the Gulf Stream core, a frontal zone near Cape Hatteras, a frontal zone near Cape Canaveral, slope water of the North Atlantic (north of a meander in the Gulf Stream) and at several locations in the Irish Sea.