Overview
BELLHOP is a beam/ray tracing model by Michael B. Porter (Heat, Light, and Sound Research, Inc.) for predicting acoustic pressure fields in ocean environments. The model accounts for:
- Sound speed profiles (SSPs) varying with depth and range
- Ocean boundaries (surface and seafloor) with complex reflection properties
- Acoustic sources and receiver arrays in arbitrary geometries
- Both 2D (range-depth) and 3D (range-depth-azimuth) propagation modeling
The core algorithms implement:
- Geometric ray tracing
- Gaussian beam superposition for smooth field predictions
- Arrival time and amplitude calculations
- Coherent and incoherent field summation
Documentation
The BELLHOP code base includes extensive historic documentation from the original
Acoustics Toolbox project and subsequent development efforts:
User guides
Text file formats
PDF documentation
Coverage documentation
Changelogs
Miscellaneous