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To overcome the environmental impacts of releasing oil into the ocean for testing acoustic methods in field experiments using autonomous underwater vehicles (AUVs), environmentally friendly gas bubble plumes with low rise velocities are proposed in this research to be used as proxies for oil. An experiment was conducted to test the performance of a centrifugal-type microbubble generator in generating microbubble plumes and their practicability to be used in field experiments. Sizes of bubbles were measured with a Laser In-Situ Scattering and Transmissometry sensor. Residence time of bubble plumes was estimated by using a Ping360 sonar. Results from the experiment showed that a larger number of small bubbles were found in deeper water as larger bubbles rose quickly to the surface without staying in the water column. The residence time of the generated bubble plumes at the depth of 0.5 m was estimated to be over 5 min. The microbubble generator is planned to be applied in future field experiments, as it is effective in producing relatively long-endurance plumes that can be used as potential proxies for oil plumes in field trials of AUVs for delineating oil spills.

Item Type:	Refereed Article
Keywords:	microbubbles, proxy, oil spill, sonar, size of bubbles, residence time
Research Division:	Engineering
Research Group:	Communications engineering
Research Field:	Signal processing
Objective Division:	Defence
Objective Group:	Defence
Objective Field:	Maritime
UTAS Author:	Hwang, J (Miss Jimin Hwang)
ID Code:	146420
Year Published:	2021
Web of Science® Times Cited:	4
Deposited By:	NC Maritime Engineering and Hydrodynamics
Deposited On:	2021-09-06
Last Modified:	2021-10-26
Downloads:	5 View Download Statistics