Design and Implementation of Real-Time Underwater Acoustic Multimedia Transmission Modem

With the escalating demand for image observation and video transmission in underwater environments, real-time wireless multimedia transmission stands as the pivotal stride in the advancement of ocean exploration and observation systems. While acoustic communication remains the most dependable solution for underwater wireless communication, multimedia transmission still grapples with the challenges of limited band-width and poor channel quality. In this paper, we introduce a self-developed underwater acoustic modem especially tailored to real-time multimedia transmission. This comprehensive design spans across hardware components, the application layer, data link layer, and the physical layer. The utilization of multi-band retransmission mechanisms and sophisticated physical layer algorithms contributes to the system's resilience against the complexities of the underwater acoustic channel. Subsequent communication experiments have been conducted in both Zhoushan, Zhejiang, and the South China Sea, focusing on horizontal and vertical underwater acoustic channels respectively. Through these trials, the system's demodulation and retransmission capabilities have been duly validated, resulting in the successful transmission of multimedia video files on multiple occasions.