Simplex simulated annealing, a hybrid approach to geoacoustic inversion with application to Mediterranean Sea acoustic data
Date
1999
Authors
Fallat, Mark Ryan
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Abstract
Recently, in ocean acoustics, there has been a great deal of interest in the development of inversion algorithms. One problem these algorithms have been applied to is geoacoustic inversion. In geoacoustic inversion, properties of the seabed are sought from measurements of acoustic energy that has propagated through the ocean environment. In this thesis, a new hybrid algorithm, simplex simulated annealing, is developed for the geoacoustic inversion problem. Simplex simulated annealing is a combination of the local downhill simplex method and a fast simulated annealing global search algorithm. Hybrid algorithms are effective and efficient because they exploit the good features of the local and global algorithms while overcoming the respective weaknesses of the techniques. The simplex simulated annealing algorithm is validated using synthetic testcases and is compared with both downhill simplex and simulated annealing. The new algorithm is also applied to experimental data recorded in the Mediterranean Sea. For the experimental inversion the results are in good agreement with the available ground truth data and results from previous experiments conducted in the same region.