Spatial correlation of the acoustic vector field of the surface noise in three-dimensional ocean environments

Spatial correlation of ocean ambient noise is a classical and attractive topic in ocean acoustics. Usually acoustic particle velocity can be formulated by the gradient of sound pressure. But due to the complexity of the sound pressure in range-dependent environments, the velocities of the surface noise are too difficult to be solved by this way. Fortunately, by taking advantage of the exchangeability of partial derivative and integral operation, a new derivation was proposed and a vector model for the surface-generated noise in three-dimensional ocean environments was developed directly from the correlation function of sound pressure. As a model verification, spatial correlation of the acoustic vector field of the surface noise in a range-independent environment was derived, and the identical correlation functions were given compared with the literature. After then, the surface noise in a range-dependent environment was considered with a rigid bottom hypothesis. The effects on the correlation taken by the bottom sloping and medium absorption were analyzed numerically.