Modal processing for acoustic communications in shallow water experiment

Acoustical array data from the Shallow Water Acoustics experiment was processed to show the feasibility of broadband mode decomposition as a preprocessing method to reduce the effective channel delay spread and concentrate received signal energy in a small number of independent channels. The data were collected by a vertical array designed at the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution. Phase-shift Keying (PSK) m-sequence modulated signals with different carrier frequencies were transmitted at a distance 19.2 km from the array. Even during a strong internal waves activity a low bit error rate was achieved.