117 results about "Side-scan sonar" patented technology

A sonar transducer assembly includes a housing mountable to a water craft capable of traversing a surface of a body of water. The sonar transducer assembly includes a linear downscan transmit / receive transducer element positioned within the housing, aimed downwardly, and configured to transmit sonar pulses in the form of a fan-shaped beam perpendicular to a plane of the surface of the water, and further configured to receive sonar returns from the sonar pulses and convert sound energy of the sonar returns into downscan sonar return data. The sonar transducer assembly also includes at least one sidescan receive-only transducer element positioned within the housing, aimed outwardly and downwardly, and configured to receive sonar returns from the sonar pulses and convert sound energy of the sonar returns into sidescan sonar return data.

A 360-degree sonar imaging system and method are provided. The system includes a sonar transducer assembly pod with tilted mechanically scanning sonar (MSS) transducers that is deployed into the water below the bottom of the boat. The system provides photo-like imaging of an area surrounding a boat which does not require the boat to be in motion. The pod is deployed by a variety of manual, (trolling motor, transom) or powered mechanical (bow, transom, or fairing block) deployment mechanisms to allow for deployment and retraction of the sonar transducer assembly. In particular embodiments, the MSS system communicates with a side-scan-sonar-imaging-equipped control head unit to display the images generated therefrom. Various speeds and sector scans are provided, as well as a locked side-scan sonar mode. Waypoint navigation and split screen views are also provided.

A high resolution bathymetric sidescan sonar system for measuring micro-geomorphy of the sea bottom having an underwater vehicle, an underwater electronic subsystem mounted on the underwater vehicle and containing a transmitter and a receiver, and two sonar arrays mounted symmetrically on two sides of a lower part of the underwater vehicle and being connected to the underwater electronic subsystem through a cable. Each sonar array has a transmitting linear array and three or more parallel receiving linear arrays. The parallel receiving linear arrays are arranged at equal spaces, and the space d between two adjacent parallel receiving linear arrays is λ>d≧λ / 2, in which λ is a wavelength of an acoustic wave, and an operation frequency of the parallel receiving linear arrays ranges from 30 kHz to 1200 kHz.

The invention discloses an underwater cultural relic integrated detection device based on an ROV platform, which includes a deck device and an underwater integrated detection device, and belongs to the technical field of marine detection. Deck installations include the mother ship, GPS system, ultra-short baseline transceiver and ROV console. The underwater detection device integrates magnetometer, multi-beam sonar, side-scan sonar, high-definition camera, shallow stratum profiler (shallow profiler) and ultra-short baseline acoustic beacon on the ROV platform. The magnetometer is used to measure the magnetic anomalies in the detection area and roughly determine the location of the underwater cultural relics. The shallow profiler is used to describe the cross-sectional structure of the underwater strata, which is used to detect the location of cultural relics buried below the mud surface. Multi-beam sonar and side-scan sonar are used to provide high-resolution underwater acoustic images, combined with high-definition cameras to detect the location of cultural relics on mud surfaces. The device of the invention integrates and fuses various sensor information, realizes the visualized and refined real-time detection of underwater cultural relics, and improves the detection efficiency of underwater cultural relics archaeological operations.

The invention relates to an underwater side-scan sonar collecting and releasing device arranged under a boat bow deck. The device is characterized in that the boat bow is provided with a slot so as to be convenient for arranging the sonar on the boat bow, the slot can also be used for collecting an underwater sonar, and after the sonar is collected, the sonar can be covered; the sonar is arranged on a collecting and releasing rod, and the collecting and releasing rod is driven through a transmission device comprising an electromotor, a speed reducer, a stainless steel chain, and the like to rotate so as to send the sonar into water; after the sonar reaches a boat bow working position vertical to the bottom of the boat, an electrical push rod pushes a positioning pin to insert into a positioning hole so as to improve the rigidity of the sonar collecting and releasing rod; and the rotation angle of collecting and releasing the sonar is measured by an encoder connected to a rotation shaft. The imaging quality of the sonar arranging device is high, and the device can realize the quick collection and release of the underwater sonar; after the sonar is placed, the positioning pin is inserted, which can effectively guarantee the working precision of the sonar; the sonar can be guaranteed to be correctly collected and released through the encoder; and by integrating the three points, the detection precision of the sonar can be effectively and greatly improved, and the device is convenient to use.

A processing method of this invention relates to an angle of arrival estimation technique, where by a high resolution bathymetric sidescan sonar signal process method it measure the micro-geomorphy of the sea bottom. This is the multi-subarray sub-space fitting method. The invention shows that when the array elements number is fixed, no matter there is mutual coupling or not between array elements, there exists one sub-array which has the smallest phase estimation standard deviation, the method of this invention overcomes the phase error caused by mutual coupling and enhances the measurement precision.

A sonar transducer assembly includes a housing mountable to a water craft capable of traversing a surface of a body of water. The sonar transducer assembly includes a linear downscan transmit / receive transducer element positioned within the housing, aimed downwardly, and configured to transmit sonar pulses in the form of a fan-shaped beam perpendicular to a plane of the surface of the water, and further configured to receive sonar returns from the sonar pulses and convert sound energy of the sonar returns into downscan sonar return data. The sonar transducer assembly also includes at least one sidescan receive-only transducer element positioned within the housing, aimed outwardly and downwardly, and configured to receive sonar returns from the sonar pulses and convert sound energy of the sonar returns into sidescan sonar return data.

The invention provides a bionic multi-navigation-state deep unmanned submersible. An underwater camera is arranged in the center of the bow of a deep unmanned submersible body, and telescopic mechanical arms are arranged on the two sides of the bow of the deep unmanned submersible body correspondingly. The two sides of the middle of the deep unmanned submersible body are each provided with side-scan sonar. A tuna bionic tail fin is arranged at the tail of the deep unmanned submersible body. Three sets of grooves are formed in the lower portion of the deep unmanned submersible body. A set of walking legs is arranged in each groove and includes two walking legs. Each walking leg comprises a first motor installed in the deep unmanned submersible body, a first arm hinged to an output shaft of the first motor, a second arm hinged to the end of the first arm, and a third arm hinged to the end of the second arm, wherein a second motor is arranged at the hinge position of the first arm and the second arm, a third motor is arranged at the hinge position of the second arm and the third arm, and the second arm is a bent arm. The bionic multi-navigation-state deep unmanned submersible can travel at the seabed and sample targets at the seabed.

The invention relates to an underwater pipeline detector based on an underwater robot. The underwater pipeline detector comprises an overwater control device and an underwater detection device, wherein the overwater control device is connected with the underwater detection device through an umbilical cable; the underwater detection device is arranged on the underwater robot, and is used for detecting position and burial depth of a seabed pipeline; and the overwater control device is used for controlling operation of the underwater detection device. Compared with the prior art, the underwater pipeline detector solves the difficulty that the position and the burial depth of the pipeline cannot be detected by means of an acoustic wave pipeline instrument detection method, multi-beam side-scan sonar detection, magnetic detection, ROV camera shooting, diving photographing by a diver and the like in a deep water region and under a turbid condition. Through adopting the method of combining the overwater equipment with the underwater equipment, and regarding ROV as a carrier, the underwater pipeline detector enters the deep water region, carries out non-destructive detection by adopting an electromagnetic induction principle, and overcomes the pipeline detection difficulties of small pipe diameter, sludge and sand layer coverage and turbid water region.

The invention relates to an automatic ship draught detection system based on the multi-beam side-scan sonar technology. The automatic ship draught detection system comprises an underwater sonar scanning subsystem, a sonar signal processing subsystem and a master control subsystem. The underwater sonar scanning subsystem comprises a sonar transducer and a rotating motor, wherein the sonar transducer is provided with a 360-degree rotating shaft, and the rotating motor is used for driving the sonar transducer to rotate. The sonar signal processing subsystem comprises a watertight electronic cabin and a digital signal processing module located in the watertight electronic cabin, and data and command transmission between the sonar signal processing subsystem and the master control subsystem is carried out through a watertight cable. The rotating motor of the underwater sonar scanning subsystem is fixed in the watertight electronic cabin and connected with the digital signal processing module. The master control subsystem comprises a master control computer and a power supply unit, and display and control software of the automatic ship draught detection system operates on the master control computer. The automatic ship draught detection system has the advantages of being small in investment, easy to install and maintain and high in measuring accuracy, and the measurement process is convenient and fast to carry out and efficient.

The invention relates to the technical field of underwater sound transducers, in particular to a high-frequency hydrophone array applicable to underwater phased array camera and a production method thereof, and solves the technical problems that a large cardinal number of high-frequency hydrophone array elements need to be accurately located and disposed in a limited array area and charge sensed by efficient coupling array elements is required to pick up and receive high-frequency weak underwater sound signals. A piezoelectric device PVDF (polyvinylidene fluoride) film, a rigid backing and PCBs (printed circuit board) are jointed; the high-frequency PVDF hydrophone backing is made of copper to increase sensitivity; multiple layers of PCBs are used as a substrate; a large number of array element backings are integrally pre-processed; the array element backing clusters are positioned and fitted to the PCB substrate; the backing units are separated by secondary processing; decoupling bars are added among the separated units; the piezoelectric film is adhered to form an array; finally, watertight sealing is performed to form the high-frequency piezoelectric film hydrophone array. The high-frequency hydrophone array is applicable to high-frequency sonar receiving arrays for imaging sonar, multi-beam sonar, side-scan sonar and the like.

The invention provides a submarine cable laying quality detection system. The submarine cable laying quality detection system comprises a surveying vessel, a DGPS (Differential Global Positioning System) positioning device, a depth finder, a side scan sonar, a magnetic finder and a controller; the controller is connected with the DGPS positioning device, the depth finder, the side scan sonar and the magnetic finder; the controller is arranged on the surveying vessel; the DGPS positioning device is used for providing positioning coordinates; the depth finder is used for performing submarine cable route measurement; the side scan sonar is used for performing submarine cable pipe scanning; the magnetic finder is used for measuring the submarine cable buried depth; the controller is used for performing analysis on measurement data. The submarine cable laying quality detection system can be applied to the underwater submarine cable measurement and the accurate data and good measurement results can be provided for the engineering acceptance through the obtained measurement results.

A computer based system and method for real-time display of co-registered historical and current side scan sonar imagery during a side scan sonar survey. Embodiments also include modules for detection of clutter in the current imagery, identification of features, extraction of snippets, filtering based on predetermined size and shape parameters, and determination if a current feature is the same as a previously identified contact from historical imagery.

The invention provides a side-scan sonar image feature extraction method based on a full convolutional neural network. The method comprises the following steps: carrying out the data augmentation through an original sonar image, and set needed by model training and testing; manually labeling the edge area of the submarine topography of each image in the sample set, distinguishing a target and a background, and obtaining a model training and testing label graph; an FCNs model is constructed; inputting the submarine topographic map and the corresponding label map into a network, training the network by adopting a small-batch gradient descent method of a driving quantity item, and storing an optimal network model; comparing convergence and stability of the network under a random gradient descent method and a small-batch gradient descent method; and extracting terrain edge contour features, outputting a feature extraction result, and carrying out qualitative evaluation on the result. According to the method, complex preprocessing is not needed, and the sonar feature extraction method is high in speed, high in efficiency and high in speckle noise resistance; the performance of the network is improved, and the convergence and stability of each network model of the FCNs are ensured.

The invention relates to a method using a side-scan sonar to measure the tonnage of a ship. The method comprises the following steps: when a photoelectric sensor detects that ship passing signals exist, a tow fish arranged under water is started; the tow fish scans the side of a measured water area to acquire an underwater acoustic image of an underwater part of the ship; the sailing speed and the passing time of the ship are simultaneously measured, and the length of a ship body is calculated according to the product of the ship speed and the passing time; an underwater acoustic image of a measured area is acquired by a computer connected with the tow fish; then image processing is conducted on the underwater acoustic image of the measured area, so as to extract an acoustic shielding shadow of the measured ship; the draft depth of the ship body and the width of the ship body below a water line are acquired according to a combination of a projection relationship and measured environmental parameters; the total tonnage of the ship is calculated according to the length of the ship body, the draft depth, the width of the ship body below the water line, and a square model coefficient of the ship marked on a ship-borne certificate; and the difference between the total tonnage and the net tonnage of the ship marked on the ship-borne certificate equals to the actual-load tonnage of the ship.

The invention belongs to the field of automatic recognition and classification of underwater targets, in particular to an automatic classification method of side scan sonar image targets based on transfer learning and depth learning. The method includes acquiring a conventional optical image data set with segmentation annotations; carrying out the contour segmentation by using the annotated imagescorresponding to each image in the data set; selecting a convolution neural network structure for training to obtain the source domain target classification network; fozening the parameters of the front part of the fully trained source domain target classification network, and setting the parameters of the back part of the classification network to the trainable state; continuing to train the setclassification network using the training set; when the training is complete, using the verification set to evaluate the performance of the classification network. The method uses the transfer learning method to transfer the convolution neural network trained with non-side scan sonar images, and pre-processes the source domain data set according to the similarity principle, so as to improve the transfer learning efficiency and prevent the negative transfer phenomenon.

A 360-degree sonar imaging system and method are provided. The system includes a sonar transducer assembly pod with tilted mechanically scanning sonar (MSS) transducers that is deployed into the water below the bottom of the boat. The system provides photo-like imaging of an area surrounding a boat which does not require the boat to be in motion. The pod is deployed by a variety of manual, (trolling motor, transom) or powered mechanical (bow, transom, or fairing block) deployment mechanisms to allow for deployment and retraction of the sonar transducer assembly. In particular embodiments, the MSS system communicates with a side-scan-sonar-imaging-equipped control head unit to display the images generated therefrom. Various speeds and sector scans are provided, as well as a locked side-scan sonar mode. Waypoint navigation and split screen views are also provided.

The invention discloses a seabed cable detection method based on side scan sonar data fusion and precision processing; the seabed cable detection in a sonar image is affected by multi-factors and hardto make, and the seabed cable is hard to be accurately detected in the prior art. The method can accurately detect the seabed so as to carry out later slope distance correction. The method uses a LOGfunction filtered image as the input image of a Canny detection algorithm, carries out seabed tracking, fuses the result with a threshold value method tracking result, removes abnormal values of thefused seabed cable via interpolation and filtering, and compares same with single beam sounding data. The method takes the Shenzhen Dapeng bay sea area as the case for verification, and obtains a tracking precision with a root-mean-square error at + / - 0.2m, thus verifying the feasibility of the method. The detection method can be applied in seabed cable precision detection under complex conditions.

Provided are a sonar system and transducer assembly for producing a 3D image of an underwater environment. The sonar system may include a housing having a transmit transducer that may transmit sonar pulses into the water. The system may include at least one sidescan transducer array in the housing that receives first and second sonar returns with first and second transducer elements and converts the first and second returns into first and second sonar return data. The first sidescan element may also transmit second sonar pulses, and at least one of the sidescan elements may receive the second sonar pulses to generate sidescan sonar return data. A sonar signal processor may then generate a 3D mesh data and sidescan image data and generate a 3D image data based on the 3D mesh data and sidescan image data. An associated method of using the sonar system is also provided.

The invention discloses a method for processing navigation track of a side scan sonar tow-fish based on a navigation track line file, which comprises the following steps: firstly, extracting navigation track point coordinate information in the navigation track line file, adopting a Bessel's interpolation model to smoothly process the navigation track point coordinate information, fitting a practical navigation track of a tow-fish, then counting the number of the received scan lines when the tow-fish runs between adjacent navigation track coordinate points according to time information, and finally acquiring instantaneous coordinates when the tow-fish runs through equidistant interpolation. The method makes full use of the navigation track line file, simplifies the navigation track processing process, and effectively solves the problem of uneven scan line distribution due to unstable ship speed and asynchronous scanning and positioning. Simultaneously, the method can acquire good correcting effect on scan line intersection caused by the change of the progression direction of the tow-fish. The method for processing the navigation track of the sonar tow-fish can effectively eliminate various gaps generated during geographic coding of side scan sonar data so as to acquire clear and continuous submarine landform images.

The invention discloses an image splicing method aiming at side-scan sonar imaging features. The method aims at solving the problems of low resolution, serious noise pollution, ghosting, Doppler effects and the like in the side-scan sonar imaging. According to the method, the study is carried out on the basis of a splicing problem of image feature points; the scale-space-theory-fusing Harris corner detection and SIFT feature description on corners are mainly studied; and further, the image registration is realized. In an image fusion stage, after the image conversion relationship corresponding, affine transformation and weighted average methods are sequentially adopted for completing the image fusion in the space and pixels, and a complete spliced image is obtained.

The invention discloses a target detection method of a side scan sonar. The target detection method of the side scan sonar can effectively reduce an image noise and a small noise caused by factors such as scatter from water surface or water and furthermore has advantages of high processing efficiency and high detection accuracy. According to the target detection method, a weighted average template based on a 3*3 window is used for performing low-pass filtering on the image of the side scan sonar, thereby effectively eliminating a scattering noise caused by reasons of water surface scattering or in-water scattering in the image, and reducing processing stress and complexity for subsequent processing. Then a K means algorithm is utilized for classifying the pixels of the sonar image to a target kind and a shadow kind and generating two kinds of different images, thereby facilitating subsequent processing to the target and the shadow and improving processing efficiency. Furthermore a pyramid increase / reduction algorithm is used for eliminating the small noise in the image. Finally phony targets are further eliminated according to the area of a suspected target, the area of a corresponding suspected shadow and a ratio between the area of the suspected target and the area of the corresponding suspected shadow, thereby improving detection accuracy.

The present invention discloses an underwater target rapid extraction method for side-scan sonar imaging. The method can perform real-time analysis on a side-scan sonar image and quickly extract an underwater target. According to the method, adaptive non-linear complex diffusion model filtering is performed on a side-scan sonar image of which the multiplicative noises are prominent, so that a noise problem in the side-scan sonar image can be improved; the de-noised sonar image is pre-segmented, and the target region, seabed reverberation region and shade region of the side-scan sonar image are automatically determined; the contours of the pre-segmentation results are redefined, so that time for constantly re-defining an initial level set in level set model evolution can be decreased in a segmentation process; a variation level set model-based evolution and segmentation are performed on the target region and the shade region; and binarization is performed on a target to be extracted, clear segmentation results of the three regions are displayed for an operator. According to the underwater target rapid extraction method for the side-scan sonar imaging of the invention, target extraction is performed on a real-time side-scan sonar, and therefore, the method has the advantages of high detection real-time performance, high detection stability and high accuracy, provides a reliable guarantee for underwater detection and target tracking.

The invention provides a side-scan sonar underwater high-precision positioning system and method. The system comprises a measuring ship, a tow fish and an ultra-short baseline positioning module, and is characterized in that the measuring ship is provided with a GPS unit and a control unit, and the control unit is respectively connected to the GPS unit and the ultra-short baseline positioning module; the ultra-short baseline positioning module is used for determining relative three-dimensional position coordinates of the tow fish and a specific component thereon relative to the measuring ship; the control unit is used for determining position coordinates of the measuring ship by using the GPS unit; and performing positioning on the tow ship according to the relative three-dimensional position coordinates and the position coordinates of the measuring ship so as to acquire positioning information.

The invention discloses a connecting device used for carrying a side-scan sonar and a working method thereof, belonging to the technical field of naval architecture and ocean engineering. The connecting device comprises a hanger rod mechanism and a rack mechanism. The hanger rod mechanism consists of a lifting point part, a cardan joint, a vertical pull rod, and the like. The rack mechanism consists of a Z-shaped cross beam, a torsion and bending resisting part, a vertical fastened side-scan sonar part, an axial limiting part, and the like. The side-scan sonar is fastened on the rack mechanism which is fixedly connected with the hanger rod mechanism through six mounting screw holes and bolts. The entire connecting device is ingenious in design, simple in structure, convenient to install and uninstall, high in strength and rigidity, light in weight, simple in maintenance and high in operating reliability. The connecting device can effectively resist the interferences from sea wind, wave and flowing loads, can not only be hung at a shoreside of a wharf but also be hung at a gunwale or a stern shrouding of a boat, and can move under traction along with the navigation of the boat. The connecting device can self-adaptively adjust the measurement angle of the side-scan sonar to keep the side-scan sonar stay at the optimum position and posture all the time so as to improve the detection precision and the measurement effect of the side-scan sonar.

The invention relates to a secondary echo suppression and geomorphologic map fusion method based on sounding side-scan sonar, comprising two steps: (1) secondary echo suppression: a piece of sounding side-scan sonar passes through a plurality of receiving array elements to eliminate secondary sea echo using a beam-forming technology and a Chebyshev weighting method; and (2) geomorphologic map fusion: a side-scan geomorphologic map acquired by a single receiving array element and a side-scan geomorphologic map acquired by multiple receiving array elements are fused, wherein there are mainly single-array element side-scan maps near the position right below, and there are mainly multi-array element weighted side-scan maps at other positions. The problem of ghosting in conventional side-scan sonar geomorphologic maps is well eliminated. A single-array element side-scan map and a multi-array element side-scan map are fused effectively to get a higher-quality side-scan geomorphologic map, which facilitates interpretation of the submarine geomorphology.

The invention provides a construction control method for dimension stone deepwater precise throwing and filling, and belongs to the field of construction of dimension stone deepwater throwing and filling. The method comprises the following steps that a throwing and filling ship achieves positioning through a mooring system and GPSes, the cable force of a cable system of the mooring system is detected in real time through a force measurement system, and a stranded cable of the mooring system is controlled so that the throwing and filling ship can be in position precisely; a transportation ship moors alongside and is connected with the throwing and filling ship in a binding manner, and dimension stone is transported to the throwing and filling ship; the underwater original foundation bed surface position is measured and recorded through a dimension stone throwing and filling measurement and control system, a chute system is used for carrying out throwing and filling on the dimension stone, the plane position and elevation of throwing and filling of the dimension stone are monitored and recorded in real time through the dimension stone throwing and filling measurement and control system, when the designed elevation of throwing and filling is achieved, throwing and filling are stopped, the stranded cable is controlled through the force measurement system so that the throwing and filling ship can move to the next ship position, and the above throwing and filling work is repeated; and after the throwing and filling work is finished, multiple beams and side-scan sonar are combined for remeasuring the construction result. The method is suitable for the working conditions of the high flow speed and the large water depth and can precisely control throwing and filling of the dimension stone.

The invention discloses a data-driving-based AUV (Autonomous Underwater Vehicle) undersea target search navigation system and method. The system comprises a task information processing module, a side-scan sonar, a target characteristic extraction module, a height gauge, a first-stage path generation module, a second-stage path generation module, a third-stage path generation module, an independentdecision-making module and an AUV actuating mechanism; the task information processing module receives task information and processes the task information in combination with a position state of an AUV to acquire dynamic grid chart coordinates; the first-stage path generation module generates a first-stage path point set; the side-scan sonar detects a sonar image; the target characteristic extraction module transmits coordinates of a target region to the second-stage path generation module to generate a second-stage path point set; height data measured by the height gauge are transmitted to the third-stage path generation module to generate a third-stage path point set; and finally, the independent decision-making module acquires an AUV path based on the three point sets and transmits theAUV path to the AUV actuating mechanism. The data-driving-based AUV undersea target search navigation system can search an undersea target and realize collision preventation of set-height navigationand can improve the undersea target search efficiency.