Ambient noise modeling for high fidelity acoustic simulation

A high fidelity acoustic simulator has been developed to enable realistic simulation of array time series in order to test sensing/processing algorithms. This simulator, capable of generating calibrated hydrophone or vector sensor array data, is fully integrated into a three-dimensional hydrodynamic array model, generating sensor time series for dynamically evolving array shape, location, and orientation. Furthermore, the simulator handles a changing number and configuration of acoustic sources, targets, and receivers while utilizing the legacy ray tracing code BELLHOP to account for ocean multipath effects. Properly modeling ambient noise is particularly important when determining the effect of noise on sensor/processing performance, e.g., array gain can vary significantly based on the directionality of ambient noise. Embedded in the simulator is the capability to efficiently generate broadband noise for an arbitrary noise intensity distribution as a function of depth and elevation angle (azimuthally sym...