HydroChirp: Dynamic Chirp Shaping for Reliable and Ultra-Long-Range Underwater Communication

Abstract

Recent advances in underwater communication techniques have shown significant potential for supporting diverse applications. However, little work has been done to achieve reliable and ultra-long-range underwater communication using commodity mobile devices in various underwater environments. In this paper, we present HydroChirp, a novel acoustic-signal-based underwater communication system designed to achieve reliable and ultra-long-range communication using commodity mobile devices. To do this, HydroChirp dynamically selects the channels with minimal distortion and leverages a novel chirp segmentation technique to mitigate the impact of generic and low-bandwidth noises. To address frequency offsets, HydroChirp uses an innovative frequency-noise model to estimate and compensate for noise generated by water fluctuations and determine the optimal transmission power. Furthermore, HydroChirp enhances communication reliability and range by analyzing noise patterns generated by specific underwater objects. We implement HydroChirp on commodity mobile devices and extensively evaluate its performance across various underwater scenarios. The experimental results demonstrate that HydroChirp can achieve a communication range of up to 150 meters with high reliability and efficiency.