Evaluation of a technique for predicting volume reverberation from biological scatterers in the ocean

This paper describes a technique for predicting the scattering strengths of biological scatterers in the ocean. An attempt was made to predict the seasonal variations in the biomass and volume reverberation (at various frequencies) in the Arctic. A dynamic biological population production model has been constructed which converts environmental input parameters into a prediction of the density and size distributions of the biological population as a function of space and time. This output is then converted to a prediction of the volume scattering strength by use of theoretical and empirical relationships between organism size and distribution and acoustic scattering phenomena. We have used a simple model to describe the intertrophic population dynamics of the biological scatterers. The model simulates relationships between the nutrient concentration and the population density of the various organisms. The feasibility of monitoring the biomass by acoustic techniques coupled with computer simulation is also discussed.