Underwater Acoustic Technology Advances: Theory, Systems and Marine Applications

Dear Colleagues,

Underwater acoustic technology constitutes the core scientific and engineering foundation for marine exploration, ocean environmental monitoring, underwater target detection and recognition, marine resource exploitation, and the operation of autonomous underwater platforms. As the primary means for long-range underwater information sensing and transmission, it plays an indispensable role in marine ecological conservation, offshore infrastructure construction, maritime safety surveillance, and the iterative advancement of underwater autonomous systems. With the rapid development of marine informatization and intelligentization, underwater acoustic systems are progressively evolving toward high-precision sensing, low-power operation, multifunctional integration, and intelligent collaborative networking. Nevertheless, the complex and time-varying nature of the marine environment—characterized by non-stationary acoustic channels, severe multipath propagation, ambient oceanic noise, and constrained transmission bandwidth—continues to impose significant technical bottlenecks and practical obstacles to both the innovation and engineering deployment of underwater acoustic technologies.

This Special Issue aims to consolidate and showcase the latest research breakthroughs, innovative theoretical frameworks, key technological developments, and practical engineering achievements in the field of underwater acoustic technology and its diverse applications. We cordially invite original research articles and high-quality comprehensive reviews that address underwater acoustic mechanisms, algorithmic innovations, system design, equipment upgrades, experimental validation, and multifaceted marine application practices, thereby fostering academic exchange and accelerating industrial translation in this domain.

Topics of interest for publication include, but are not limited to, the following:

• Fundamental theories and physical mechanisms of underwater acoustic propagation;
• Underwater acoustic channel modeling, characterization, and adaptive compensation techniques;
• Underwater acoustic signal processing, including noise suppression, Doppler estimation and compensation, signal enhancement, and feature extraction algorithms;
• Underwater target detection, localization, tracking, and recognition methodologies;
• Underwater acoustic communication theories, key enabling technologies, and system optimization strategies;
• Design, performance evaluation, and optimization of underwater acoustic sensors and sonar systems;
• Intelligent underwater acoustic techniques leveraging machine learning and deep learning approaches;
• Passive acoustic monitoring technologies for marine ecological environment assessment and biological observation;
• Anti-interference, high-precision detection, and robust transmission techniques for underwater acoustics in complex marine environments;
• Prototype development, lake/sea trial verification, and industrial engineering applications of underwater acoustic equipment and systems.

Dr. Bin Li
Dr. Weihua Jiang
Guest Editors

Manuscript Submission Information

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• underwater acoustic theory
• underwater acoustic channel
• underwater acoustic signal processing
• underwater acoustic communication
• target detection and recognition
• sonar system
• passive acoustic monitoring
• intelligent underwater acoustic technology
• marine intelligent equipment