Survey of high‐frequency bottom reverberation

Abstract

High‐frequency sonars are almost always reverberation limited and the most important contributor to this reverberation is backscattered energy from the ocean bottom. This has been long recognized; however, until recently the status of knowledge about this important subject was reflected in the classic paper of McKinney and Anderson [J. Acoust. Soc. Am. 36, 158–163 0964)]. In recent years there has been a revival of interest in acoustic scattering from the ocean bottom at high frequencies, including measurements at sites on the East, West, and Gulf coasts. This paper presents a survey of recent and historical work in the area.