OASIS in the sea: Measurement of the acoustic reflectivity of zooplankton with concurrent optical imaging

A new instrument Optical-Acoustic Submersible Imaging System (OASIS) has been developed for three-dimensional acoustic tracking of zooplankton with concurrent optical imaging to verify the identity of the insonified organisms. OASIS also measures in situ target strengths (TS) of freely swimming zooplankton and nekton of known identity and 3-D orientation. The system consists of a three-dimensional acoustic imaging system (FishTV), a sensitive optical CCD camera with red-filtered strobe illumination, and ancillary oceanographic sensors. The sonar triggers the acquisition of an optical image when it detects the presence of a significant target in the precise location where the camera, strobe and sonar are co-registered. Acoustic TS can then be related to the optical image, which permits identification of the animal and its 3-D aspect. stem was recently deployed (August 1996) in Saanich Inlet, B.C., Canada. Motile zooplankton and nekton were imaged with no evidence of reaction to or avoidance of the OASIS instrument package. Target strengths of many acoustic reflectors were recorded in parallel with the optical images, triggered by the presence of an animal in the correct location of the sonar system. Inspection of the optical images, corroborated with zooplankton sampling with a MOCNESS net, revealed that the joint optically and acoustically sensed taxa at the site were the euphausiid Euphausia pacifica, the gammarid amphipod Orchomene obtusa, and a gadid fish. The simultaneous optical and acoustic images permitted an exact correlation of TS and taxa. Computer simulations from a model of the backscattered strength from euphausiids are in good agreement with the observed data.