Doppler compensation for underwater acoustic communications

Doppler shift in underwater acoustic communications presents a major challenge to modern designers. Carrier tracking and symbol synchronisation are severely affected by Doppler shift induced by relative motion of the transmitting and receiving structures. This paper presents an efficient Doppler compensation system that can be used as a generic pre-processor to conventional equalisation and beamforming structures. The rationale behind the choice of the design parameters is reported as well as the experimental system performance based on results from trials in the North Sea.