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MERMAID
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MERMAID
MERMAID is a marine scientific instrument platform, short for Mobile Earthquake Recorder for Marine Areas by Independent Divers.
MERMAID evolved from a first prototype, developed and built by Scripps Institution of Oceanography in partnership with Princeton University, to a second, built by Teledyne Webb Research in collaboration with the University of Nice Sophia Antipolis, and now third-generation model, operational today, commercialized by OSEAN SAS in Le Pradet, France. Fourth-generation models add hydrographic monitoring capability to complement the acoustic sensor suite, and are designed to carry out measurement profiles to depths exceeding 4,000 m.
MERMAID is a freely-drifting float equipped with a hydrophone to collect hydroacoustic data for the study of earthquakes worldwide. Typically floating at a parking depth of 1500 m, the instrument uses a buoyancy engine (a hydraulic oil bladder system) to return to the surface for triggered data transmission (on average every 6–7 days) via the Iridium satellite constellation, to respond to on-demand data requests, and to receive mission parameter updates. MERMAID carries lithium-ion batteries, sufficient to power about 250 descend/ascend cycles, which translates to an instrument autonomy of about 5 years. A pressure sensor monitors descent depth, and a GPS receiver provides location and time corrections during the brief intervals that MERMAID surfaces (on average less than one hour).
Fourth-generation models are multidisciplinary and carry a conductivity-temperature-depth sensor to collect hydrographic profiles of ocean temperature and salinity (similar to those from the Argo program) during their voyages. They can be additionally equipped with high-frequency hydrophones for the study of, e.g. cetacean (whale) vocalizations, and other sensors.
Imaging Earth's interior via the technique of seismic tomography is reliant on dense source-receiver distribution, or data coverage, but two thirds of the Earth's surface are covered by water. Increasing station density in the oceanic domain is an objective widely shared in the global seismological research community. After the first detections of teleseismic events by first-generation MERMAID, relatively small-scale deployments of second-generation MERMAID instruments in the Mediterranean, the Indian Ocean, and in the Pacific around the Galápagos, demonstrated MERMAID's potential for closing the oceanic seismic coverage gap, both for global and regional seismic events, and for seismic tomography of the Earth's mantle.
The ongoing multinational experiment SPPIM (South Pacific Plume Imaging and Modeling), coordinated by Ifremer with JAMSTEC, deployed an array of fifty-one third-generation instruments to image, in detail, the massive mantle plume in the lower mantle beneath the South Pacific. The instruments are owned by Southern University of Science and Technology, Princeton University, JAMSTEC and Géoazur, and the data management and distribution is handled by EarthScope-Oceans.
The standard third-generation model reports pressure time-series, waveforms triggered by earthquakes, whereas the third-generation model deployed in the Mediterranean was configured to report time-resolved hydroacoustic spectral densities.
MERMAIDs first-generation model (2003-2005) retired after gathering about 120 hours of acoustic pressure data from a depth of around 700 m offshore from La Jolla, California.
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MERMAID AI simulator
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MERMAID
MERMAID is a marine scientific instrument platform, short for Mobile Earthquake Recorder for Marine Areas by Independent Divers.
MERMAID evolved from a first prototype, developed and built by Scripps Institution of Oceanography in partnership with Princeton University, to a second, built by Teledyne Webb Research in collaboration with the University of Nice Sophia Antipolis, and now third-generation model, operational today, commercialized by OSEAN SAS in Le Pradet, France. Fourth-generation models add hydrographic monitoring capability to complement the acoustic sensor suite, and are designed to carry out measurement profiles to depths exceeding 4,000 m.
MERMAID is a freely-drifting float equipped with a hydrophone to collect hydroacoustic data for the study of earthquakes worldwide. Typically floating at a parking depth of 1500 m, the instrument uses a buoyancy engine (a hydraulic oil bladder system) to return to the surface for triggered data transmission (on average every 6–7 days) via the Iridium satellite constellation, to respond to on-demand data requests, and to receive mission parameter updates. MERMAID carries lithium-ion batteries, sufficient to power about 250 descend/ascend cycles, which translates to an instrument autonomy of about 5 years. A pressure sensor monitors descent depth, and a GPS receiver provides location and time corrections during the brief intervals that MERMAID surfaces (on average less than one hour).
Fourth-generation models are multidisciplinary and carry a conductivity-temperature-depth sensor to collect hydrographic profiles of ocean temperature and salinity (similar to those from the Argo program) during their voyages. They can be additionally equipped with high-frequency hydrophones for the study of, e.g. cetacean (whale) vocalizations, and other sensors.
Imaging Earth's interior via the technique of seismic tomography is reliant on dense source-receiver distribution, or data coverage, but two thirds of the Earth's surface are covered by water. Increasing station density in the oceanic domain is an objective widely shared in the global seismological research community. After the first detections of teleseismic events by first-generation MERMAID, relatively small-scale deployments of second-generation MERMAID instruments in the Mediterranean, the Indian Ocean, and in the Pacific around the Galápagos, demonstrated MERMAID's potential for closing the oceanic seismic coverage gap, both for global and regional seismic events, and for seismic tomography of the Earth's mantle.
The ongoing multinational experiment SPPIM (South Pacific Plume Imaging and Modeling), coordinated by Ifremer with JAMSTEC, deployed an array of fifty-one third-generation instruments to image, in detail, the massive mantle plume in the lower mantle beneath the South Pacific. The instruments are owned by Southern University of Science and Technology, Princeton University, JAMSTEC and Géoazur, and the data management and distribution is handled by EarthScope-Oceans.
The standard third-generation model reports pressure time-series, waveforms triggered by earthquakes, whereas the third-generation model deployed in the Mediterranean was configured to report time-resolved hydroacoustic spectral densities.
MERMAIDs first-generation model (2003-2005) retired after gathering about 120 hours of acoustic pressure data from a depth of around 700 m offshore from La Jolla, California.
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