Geoacoustic Inversion Using Backpropagation

This paper presents inversion results of the 2006 Shallow Water Experiment (SW06) data measured on a vertical line array. A low-frequency (100-900 Hz) chirp source was towed along two tracks (circle, straight line) at 30-m depth. For the inversions, a three-step optimization scheme is applied to the data using very fast simulated reannealing (VFSR). The objective function is defined by the energy of the backpropagated signal from the array to the source. At each step, water-column sound-speed profile (SSP), experimental geometry, and geoacoustic parameters are inverted successively. An environmental model is employed consisting of a linear segmented SSP in the water column, a sediment layer, and a half-space. The geometric parameter inversion results show good agreement with in situ measurements. Finally, the estimated geoacoustic parameters show that the experimental site near the vertical line array (VLA) is fairly homogeneous in bottom properties consisting of a 21-m-thick sediment layer with sound speed of around 1600 m/s over a hard basement whose sound speed is approximately 1750 m/s.