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Networking across boundaries: enabling wireless communication through the water-air interface

Authors:

Francesco Tonolini,

Fadel AdibAuthors Info & Claims

SIGCOMM '18: Proceedings of the 2018 Conference of the ACM Special Interest Group on Data Communication

Pages 117 - 131

https://doi.org/10.1145/3230543.3230580

Published: 07 August 2018 Publication History

Abstract

We consider the problem of wireless communication across medium boundaries, specifically across the water-air interface. In particular, we are interested in enabling a submerged underwater sensor to directly communicate with an airborne node. Today's communication technologies cannot enable such a communication link. This is because no single type of wireless signal can operate well across different media and most wireless signals reflect back at media boundaries.

We present a new communication technology, translational acoustic-RF communication (TARF). TARF enables underwater nodes to directly communicate with airborne nodes by transmitting standard acoustic signals. TARF exploits the fact that underwater acoustic signals travel as pressure waves, and that these waves cause displacements of the water surface when they impinge on the water-air boundary. To decode the transmitted signals, TARF leverages an airborne radar which measures and decodes these surface displacements.

We built a prototype of TARF that incorporates algorithms for dealing with the constraints of this new communication modality. We evaluated TARF in controlled and uncontrolled environments and demonstrated that it enables the first practical communication link across the water-air interface. Our results show that TARF can achieve standard underwater bitrates up to 400bps, and that it can operate correctly in the presence of surface waves with amplitudes up to 16 cm peak-to-peak, i.e., 100,000X larger than the surface perturbations caused by TARF's underwater acoustic transmitter.

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Index Terms

Networking across boundaries: enabling wireless communication through the water-air interface
1. Computer systems organization
  1. Embedded and cyber-physical systems
    1. Sensor networks
2. Networks
  1. Network types
    1. Cyber-physical networks
    2. Mobile networks

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cover image ACM Conferences

SIGCOMM '18: Proceedings of the 2018 Conference of the ACM Special Interest Group on Data Communication

August 2018

604 pages

ISBN:9781450355674

DOI:10.1145/3230543

General Chairs:
Sergey Gorinsky
IMDEA, Spain
,
János Tapolcai
BME, Hungary

Copyright © 2018 ACM.

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Published: 07 August 2018

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Overall Acceptance Rate 462 of 3,389 submissions, 14%

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Li MLiang XZhang YXin JJiang NGuo QWang MWei JBu X(2024)A Method for Extracting Acoustic Water Surface Waves Based on Phase CompensationRemote Sensing10.3390/rs1616291116:16(2911)Online publication date: 9-Aug-2024
https://doi.org/10.3390/rs16162911
Yang SLu YWei YZhu JTu XYang YQu F(2024)A Feasibility Study of Cross-Medium Direct Acoustic Communication Between Underwater and Airborne NodesJournal of Marine Science and Engineering10.3390/jmse1212234012:12(2340)Online publication date: 20-Dec-2024
https://doi.org/10.3390/jmse12122340
Du YCao XYang YZhang TYuan JCui TYao J(2024)Acoustic Signal Reconstruction Across Water–Air Interface Through Millimeter-Wave Radar Micro-Vibration DetectionJournal of Marine Science and Engineering10.3390/jmse1211198912:11(1989)Online publication date: 4-Nov-2024
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Cui TCao XYang YTan QDu YZhang TYuan JZhu ZYao J(2024)Extraction of Underwater Acoustic Signals across Sea–Air Media Using Butterworth FilteringJournal of Marine Science and Engineering10.3390/jmse1209146912:9(1469)Online publication date: 23-Aug-2024
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