Constrained Channel Estimation Methods in Underwater Acoustics

Underwater acoustic signal processing aims to reconstruct the shallow water acoustic channel from both direct arrival and delayed multipath reflections. This enables accurate acoustic communications in shallow water, such as between underwater autonomous vehicles (UAVs), which are essential for coastal surveillance and other applications. In this work, we take a previously implemented algorithm for channel estimation and apply practical constraints motivated by shallow water acoustic physics. We base our estimation constraints on the physical properties of the rapidly fluctuating reflections from the moving sea surface and rough sea bottom. Our work aims to reduce the computation time and prediction error in the channel estimation using our constraints for real time applications.