Fourth moments of acoustic waves forward scattered by a rough ocean surface

Abstract

Three types of statistical fourth moments of acoustic waves forward scattered by a randomly rough ocean surface are derived and numerically evaluated. The first one is related to the scintillation index which characterizes intensity fluctuations. The second one is the two-position intensity correlation function which describes the spatial correlation of wave intensity. The third is the fourth-moment two-position coherence function which carries information on the phase fluctuations of the scattered wave. In the range of weak scattering, the ratio of the absolute value of the fourth-moment two-position coherence function over the two-position intensity correlation exactly describes the mean-square fluctuation of the relative phase between the two positions. The acoustic frequency is high so that the Kirchhoff approximation can be used. Two types of spectral functions for surface-height fluctuations are considered: a Gaussian spectrum and the Donelan-Pierson spectrum. The latter is obtained from a model for the fluctuations of the ocean surface height which are controlled by the wind speed at the ocean surface.