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In roughly one century, the mapping and conceptual understanding of ocean bathymetry were revolutionized as shown in the sequential maps of the North Atlantic. (A) First recorded bathymetric map created in 1853 by Maury in collaboration with the U.S. Navy only hints at the mid-ocean ridge. (B) Excerpt from the 1877 Thomson map based on the HMS Challenger measurements with line-andsinker techniques shows the fi rst continuous mapping of the mid-ocean ridge. (C) Echo sounding techniques allowed for increased frequency and a higher defi nition of the mid-ocean ridge, as shown in Theodor Stocks map from the Meteor cruises in 1927. (D) This 1968 Berann illustration, based on the Heezen and Tharp physiographic maps, outlines the ridge system in the North Atlantic (National Geographic Stock).
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Terrestrial geography, including the outline of continents, islands, mountain chains, and great plains, was clearly known by the mid-19 th century. However, the confi guration of the seafl oor was unknown and, even if there had been need, no technology was capable of accurately and quickly measuring the depths of the sea. This situation began chang...
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... oor mapping coincided with the advent of systematic oceanographic observations (i.e., modern oceanography), deep-sea scientifi c dredg- ing, and the commercial desire to lay deep-sea telegraph cables. Within a century, the concept of a featureless and static seafl oor was shattered and the fi ndings of a detailed ocean bathymetry were revealed (Fig. 1). Some of the fi rst recorded measurements of bathymetry were made by the British explorer Sir James Clark Ross in 1840, by the U.S. Coast Survey beginning in 1845 with systematic studies of the Gulf Stream, and by the U.S. Navy, under the guidance of Matthew Fontaine Maury, beginning in 1849. [1] A weighted hemp or fl ax rope was ...
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... in 1849. [1] A weighted hemp or fl ax rope was dropped over the side of a vessel "lying to" (drifting) and the length of the line recorded once the sinker or lead weight reached the bottom. From a few such measurements, the fi rst bathymetric map was produced and published by Maury in the 1853 Wind and Current Charts of the North Atlantic Ocean (Fig. 1A). Although this particular map was not very accurate, many important seafl oor features were dis- covered from such measurements. For example, the fi rst map showing the full extent of the Mid-Atlantic Ridge was produced in 1877 by Wyville Thomson from mea- surements made on HMS Challenger supplemented by additional soundings made by ...
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... important seafl oor features were dis- covered from such measurements. For example, the fi rst map showing the full extent of the Mid-Atlantic Ridge was produced in 1877 by Wyville Thomson from mea- surements made on HMS Challenger supplemented by additional soundings made by British vessels and those of the United States and other nations [1] (Fig. 1B). In 1875, HMS Challenger also discovered the fi rst indication of the Mariana Trench with a measured depth of 4475 fath- oms although it was another 30 years before the true con- fi guration of the trench was understood. [2] Just two years later in 1877, the German geographer, Augustus Peter- mann, produced the fi rst bathymetric chart ...
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... a survey of the California coast. This survey resulted in the fi rst bathymetric map produced solely by acoustic technology (Fig. 4B). These successes were followed by the famous German Meteor Expedition (1925)(1926)(1927), which resulted in over 67,000 soundings of the Atlantic Ocean. In addi- tion to mapping the axis of the Mid-Atlantic Ridge (Fig. 1C), this expedition delineated for the fi rst time the abyssal hills extending outward from the ridge axis. With the invention of the radio-acoustic ranging navigation sys- tem by the USC&GS in 1924, the position of a ship could be determined accurately and literally, millions of sound- ings were made on the continental shelf and slope of ...
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... the most widely known maps of the ocean basins are the iconic physiographic maps produced by Bruce Heezen and Marie Tharp, researchers at Columbia University's Lamont Geological Observatory, beginning in the early 1950s and subsequent collaborative illustrations of H.C. Berann in the 1960s and 1970s (Fig. 1D). These physiographic illustrations were based on data collected primarily from academic and military surveys conducted during the early Cold War era during which, due to U.S. national security restrictions, new bathymetric maps of many areas were "classifi ed" and not available to the pub- lic. [7] The physiographic approach used by ...
Citations
... The task of mapping the ocean depth has a long and interesting history (cf. [11]), and accurate maps of the seabed topography (also called bathymetry) are important for safe sea travel, off-shore-based industry and infrastructure, geological exploration, oceanography and many other purposes [47]. The most common method for depth estimation is sonar, where the bottom reflects an acoustic pulse, and the depth is computed from the travel time. ...
We consider the problem of reconstructing the seabed topography from observations of surface gravity waves. We formulate the problem as a classical inverse scattering problem using the mild-slope equation, and analyze the topographic dependence of the forward and inverse problem. Moreover, we propose a useful model simplification that makes the inverse problem much more tractable. As water waves allow for observations of the full wave field, it differs quite a lot from the classical inverse scattering problems, and we utilize this to prove a conditional stability result for the inverse problem. Last, we develop a simple and fast numerical inversion method and test it on synthetic data to verify our analysis.
... There are several survey systems for acquiring the water depth data, while their operating principle, operating environment, and delivered measurement accuracy significantly differ [18]. Currently, the most widely used measurement system is a multibeam system, which functions on the principles of aquatic acoustics [19][20][21] due to the significant limitations of electromagnetic wave propagation in the water medium [22][23][24]. The basic device of the multibeam system is a multibeam echosounder (MBES), which allows for the measurement of the depth distribution of a body of water. ...
Depth data and the digital bottom model created from it are very important in the inland and coastal water zones studies and research. The paper undertakes the subject of bathymetric data processing using reduction methods and examines the impact of data reduction according to the resulting representations of the bottom surface in the form of numerical bottom models. Data reduction is an approach that is meant to reduce the size of the input dataset to make it easier and more efficient for analysis, transmission, storage and similar. For the purposes of this article, test datasets were created by discretizing a selected polynomial function. The real dataset, which was used to verify the analyzes, was acquired using an interferometric echosounder mounted on a HydroDron-1 autonomous survey vessel. The data were collected in the ribbon of Lake Klodno, Zawory. Data reduction was conducted in two commercial programs. Three equal reduction parameters were adopted for each algorithm. The research part of the paper presents the results of the conducted analyzes of the reduced bathymetric datasets based on the visual comparison of numerical bottom models, isobaths, and statistical parameters. The article contains tabular results with statistics, as well as the spatial visualization of the studied fragments of numerical bottom models and isobaths. This research is being used in the course of work on an innovative project that aims to develop a prototype of a multi-dimensional and multi-temporal coastal zone monitoring system using autonomous, unmanned floating platforms at a single survey pass.
... Rys. 2. Pomiar głębokości za pomocą sondy ręcznej na francuskiej fregacie z 1844 r. [7] Pomimo mijających lat ta metoda pomiaru głębokości ciągle ma zastosowanie, jednakże z ograniczeniem do ograniczonej głębokości akwenu. Przykład sondy ręcznej przedstawia rys. 3. Wykorzystując sondę ręczną możemy sprawdzić rodzaj dna morskiego, gdyż ciężarek posiada w części spodniej wydrążenie do łoju, do którego podczas dotknięcia dna przykleja się materiał zalegający na dnie mierzonego akwenu. ...
Obecnie mniej niż połowa wód przybrzeżnych uznawana jest za należycie zbadaną zgodnie z nowoczesnymi normami. Obraz ten pogarsza się, jeśli weźmiemy pod uwagę, że 80% oceanów nadal pozostaje niezbadanych. Przyjmuje się, iż wiemy więcej na temat powierzchni Księżyca niż na temat głębi naszych oceanów. Głębokość morza była mierzona już przez starożytnych Greków i Rzymian, ale mapy batymetryczne zaczęły być częściej sporządzane dopiero w połowie XIX wieku.
Od tamtego czasu metody i sprzęt do pomiarów głębokości przeszły długą drogę od sondowania ołowianym odważnikiem na lince do nowoczesnych echosond wielowiązkowych. Aktualne dane batymetryczne mają zasadnicze znaczenie dla wytwarzania produktów nawigacyjnych, takich jak morskie mapy nawigacyjne, zapewniające bezpieczną żeglugę. Ponadto informacja o głębokości stanowi istotną podstawę niemal każdej działalności człowieka na morzu, w tym budownictwa portowego i przybrzeżnego, obronności i bezpieczeństwa morskiego, zarządzania strefą przybrzeżną, rybołówstwa, żeglugi morskiej oraz turystyki. Artykuł ma na celu przedstawienie historycznego rysu rozwoju technik pomiaru głębokości stosowanych w pomiarach batymetrycznych. Podstawową metodą badawczą wykorzystaną
w przygotowaniu publikacji była analiza wybranej literatury. Proces rozwoju współczesnych i przyszłych technik pomiaru głębokości nie jest procesem zamkniętym, a dzisiaj obserwujemy jego dynamiczny rozwój.
... Rys. 2. Pomiar głębokości za pomocą sondy ręcznej na francuskiej fregacie z 1844 r. [7] Pomimo mijających lat ta metoda pomiaru głębokości ciągle ma zastosowanie, jednakże z ograniczeniem do ograniczonej głębokości akwenu. Przykład sondy ręcznej przedstawia rys. 3. Wykorzystując sondę ręczną możemy sprawdzić rodzaj dna morskiego, gdyż ciężarek posiada w części spodniej wydrążenie do łoju, do którego podczas dotknięcia dna przykleja się materiał zalegający na dnie mierzonego akwenu. ...
Obecnie mniej niż połowa wód przybrzeżnych uznawana jest za należycie zbadaną zgodnie z nowoczesnymi normami. Obraz ten pogarsza się, jeśli weźmiemy pod uwagę, że 80% oceanów nadal pozostaje niezbadanych. Przyjmuje się, iż wiemy więcej na temat powierzchni Księżyca niż na temat głębi naszych oceanów. Głębokość morza była mierzona już przez starożytnych Greków i Rzymian, ale mapy batymetryczne zaczęły być częściej sporządzane dopiero w połowie XIX wieku. Od tamtego czasu metody i sprzęt do pomiarów głębokości przeszły długą drogę od sondowania ołowianym odważnikiem na lince do nowoczesnych echosond wielowiązkowych. Aktualne dane batymetryczne mają zasadnicze znaczenie dla wytwarzania produktów nawigacyjnych, takich jak morskie mapy nawigacyjne, zapewniające bezpieczną żeglugę. Ponadto informacja o głębokości stanowi istotną podstawę niemal każdej działalności człowieka na morzu, w tym budownictwa portowego i przybrzeżnego, obronności i bezpieczeństwa morskiego, zarządzania strefą przybrzeżną, rybołówstwa, żeglugi morskiej oraz turystyki. Artykuł ma na celu przedstawienie historycznego rysu rozwoju technik pomiaru głębokości stosowanych w pomiarach batymetrycznych. Podstawową metodą badawczą wykorzystana w przygotowaniu publikacji była analiza wybranej literatury. Proces rozwoju współczesnych i przyszłych technik pomiaru głębokości nie jest procesem zamkniętym, a dzisiaj obserwujemy jego dynamiczny rozwój.
... Driven by the impetus of the Second World War to provide bathymetric maps for submersible navigation, it was not until the 1940s that a concerted effort to map the planet's largest biosphere was implemented (Doel et al., 2006;Dierssen and Theberge, 2014;Lecours et al., 2016). Deep-sea research is inherently labour-and cost-intensive, with each marine expedition requiring 6-10 months of planning. ...
... MBES technology has contributed to hydrographic surveys using the ''point, line, surface'' processes, which revolutionized our understanding of seafloor morphology and processes [3], [4]. Moreover, it has greatly helped form the concepts of seafloor spreading, continental drift, and the theory of plate tectonics [5] by imaging The associate editor coordinating the review of this manuscript and approving it for publication was Yanli Xu . the submarine geomorphology in both qualitative and quantitative studies [6]- [8]. ...
Multi-beam echo sounders (MBESs) are characterized by the high resolution and high density of the sounding data. The processing of MBES bathymetry data is of special interest currently in marine surveying. The Combined Uncertainty and Bathymetry Estimator (CUBE) and surface filtering are the main MBES-processing algorithms for outliers. These algorithms involve five adjustable parameters; however, few studies have looked at parameter optimization. In this paper, a Parameter Group Optimization (PGO) method that determines the optimal parameters of CUBE and surface filtering based on the seafloor topographic characteristics of the survey area is presented. The method includes typical area selection, optimal grid resolution analysis, parameter group testing and batch processing, sounding and grid analysis. Raw MBES datasets from shallow-and deep-water survey areas (between 10 and 11000 m deep) are used to validate the proposed method. The results show that when the optimized parameters are used in the CUBE and filtering algorithm, the outliers are automatically eliminated; the processed bathymetry data is in good agreement with the bathymetry derived by a traditional manual processing method, while the processing efficiency can be improved by more than 8 times.
... In 1850, within a decade after Forbes' statement was published, a Norwegian theologian and biologist Michael Sars sailed out to a dredging expedition in the Lofoten archipelago, Norway, and anchored around 450-500 fathoms (820-910 m) and documented the presence of a number of taxa (Hjort, 1910). In 1874, the USS Tuscarora expedition used a piano-wire sounding system to record a depth of 4665 fathoms (8530 m) in the Kuril-Kamchatka Trench, originally named the Tuscarora Deep (Dierssen and Theberge, 2016). In March 1875, the expedition of HMS Challenger, led by a British oceanographer, John Murray, and a Scottish marine zoologist, Charles Wyville Thompson, sounded the Mariana Trench using the same technique adopted during the 1839-1843 expeditions and the Challenger's crew unexpectedly recorded 4474 fathoms (8184 m) at the point near the site thereafter called Challenger Deep (Thomson and Murray, 1895). ...
This chapter overviews global and local features of oceanic trenches. Most oceanic trenches are associated with plate subduction boundary systems; they form due to the downward bending of an oceanic plate entering a subduction system. Their total length is 47,900 km, longer than Earth's circumference. There are 27 hadal trenches with their deepest points situated in the hadal zone (water depths < − 6 km). Most of these are located along erosive plate subduction margins. The hadal trenches occupy 33% of the entire hadal seafloor and accommodate more than 90% of the global seafloor with water depths of <− 7 km. The depths of oceanic trenches are explained systematically by the present-day oceanic crustal age, sediment thickness, and isostatic correction. Recent high-resolution bathymetric surveys have revealed that the seafloors within oceanic trenches do not always show V-shaped structures with very steep landward and seaward slopes. Several trenches locally accommodate flat floors with small isolated depositional basins along the trench axis. For example, the Japan Trench has several tens of small trench-fill basins with their largest area of ~ 30 km². Further detailed surveys are necessary to better understand the geomorphology of deep trench floors worldwide – the least studied places on the Earth's surface.
... The traditional wreck searching method was to tow ropes across the seabed which were fastened to two ships [5]. This technique continued to be used after the introduction of the first acoustic device because it was capable of locating small or very narrow targets on the seabed which were not detected by echosounders. ...
The seabed of the Baltic Sea is not yet fully searched for and investigated. In 2004 the crew of the Polish Navy hydrographic ship Arctowski discovered a new shipwreck that was not listed in the official underwater objects database nor was it marked on a chart. The identity of a new wreck is most frequently established based on artefacts found in the object by divers as a part of archaeological research, or through underwater inspection with remotely operated vehicle. The aim of this paper is to show how acoustic remote sensing data is used to identify large bottom object without having to go underwater. Bathymetric survey and sonar investigation were conducted over the study area. An appropriate methodology allowed for obtaining high-resolution imagery of the wreck. A review of literature concerning the end of World War II in the Baltic Sea was carried out. Moreover, the author presents a comparative analysis and evaluation of remote sensing data with archival photos, silhouette, and ship characteristics. The proposed approach led to the identification of a new Baltic Sea wreck as the General von Steuben, which was torpedoed in 1945 by soviet submarine. The author's findings show that state of preservation of the shipwreck, quality data as well as historical records play a key role in establishing the wreck's identity.
... Up until the mid-20 th century, the seafl oor was thought to be featureless consisting of bits of rock and sediment eroded from the continents and fl ushed into the ocean reservoirs. [1] However, we now know that ocean bathymetry encompasses a varied seascape including vast mountain ranges, deep trenches, fracture zones extending for thousands of miles, the fl attest plains on Earth, and a plethora of lesser meso-and microscale features ranging from individual seamounts to individual ripples and tidal channels. Comprehension of this landscape is a key component of the theory of plate tectonics, an intrinsic part of marine ecology, and a signifi cant component of ocean circulation on global scales to individual estuaries. ...
... Virtually all of the primary and many of the secondary features of the world ocean were discovered by either line and sinker technology or by single-beam echo sounding. [1] However, because the introduction of multibeam sounding systems coupled with the global positioning system, [2] many additional deep-sea features have been discovered including hydrothermal vents and vent fi elds, mud volcanoes, mud wave and dune fi elds, individual lava fl ows, landslide scars, and diapiric structures including commercially valuable salt domes. ...
... Ridges and rises associated with seafl oor spreading can be found in all fi ve of the ocean basins. As mapped in the 1800s, [1] [12] ). Source: Image from NOAA, NOS, NCCOS Biogeography Branch. ...
... Bathymetry is the study and measurement of water depth and is fundamental to various domains such as maritime navigation, port management, offshore oil and resource exploration and habitat mapping for marine conservation. Historically, bathymetry data was collected using a lead (or sounding) line; a rope with a heavy weight attached and lowered from a ship until the weight hit the seabed (Dierssen and Theberge, 2016). Modern surveys typically use multibeam echosounders (MBES) mounted to survey vessels which collect thousands of depth measurements per second which greatly increases the rate of acquiring depth data, as well as the spatial coverage. ...
It is estimated that over 80% of the world’s oceans are unexplored and unmapped limiting our understanding of ocean systems. Due to data collection rates of modern survey technologies such as swathe multibeam echosounders (MBES) and initiatives such as Seabed 2030, there is ever-increasing increasing volume of seafloor data collected. These large data volumes present significant challenges around quality assurance and validation with current approaches often requiring manual input. The aim of this study is to test the efficacy of applying novel 3D Convolutional Neural Network models to the problem of removing noise from MBES point cloud data, with a view to increasing the automation of processing bathymetric data. The results reported from hold-out test sets show promising performance with a classification accuracy of 97% and kappa scores of 0.94 on voxelized point cloud data. Deploying a sufficiently trained model in a productionized processing pipeline could be transformational, reducing the manual intervention required to take raw MBES point cloud data to a bathymetric data product.
