Underwater three-dimensional imaging using narrowband MIMO array

To obtain high cross-range resolution, the underwater 3-D acoustic imaging system usually requires a rectangular array with a great number of sensors and a large physical size. To reduce the sensor number and the array physical size simultaneously, this paper proposes a new underwater 3-D acoustic imaging approach based on a novel multiple-input multiple-output (MIMO) array. Specifically, the MIMO array is composed of four uniform linear arrays (ULAs) located on four sides of a rectangle. The transmitting array composed of two ULAs is located on a pair of opposite sides, and the receiving array composed of another two ULAs is located on the other two sides. Furthermore, narrowband waveforms coded with orthogonal polyphase sequences are employed as transmitting waveforms. When the subcode numbers in the polyphase coded sequences are sufficient, the MIMO array has the same 3-D imaging ability as a rectangular array, which has a two-time bigger size than that of the former. Consequently, the MIMO array can not only save a great number of sensors, but halve the array size, when compared to a rectangular array with the same cross-range resolution. Computer simulations are provided to demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed imaging approach.