Research Progress on High-Precision Acoustic Measurement and Control Technologies for Deep-Sea Test Sites

As a core platform for the research and development of deep-sea equipment, deep-sea test sites have become an important indicator of a country’s competitiveness in marine science and technology. Due to the rapid attenuation of electromagnetic waves in water, acoustic waves have become the only effective carrier for long-range, high-precision measurement and control in the deep ocean. However, complex and highly variable deep-sea sound-speed profiles, severe multipath effects, and time-varying channel fading pose significant challenges to the robustness and accuracy of underwater acoustic systems. Against this backdrop, this paper systematically reviews the latest research progress in underwater acoustic measurement and control technologies for deep-sea test sites from three key dimensions. In terms of target perception, to address stealthy targets and strong clutter backgrounds, detection architectures are evolving from monostatic configurations toward active–passive cooperation and distributed heterogeneous arrays—aiming to overcome physical aperture limitations and enable high-resolution detection of weak targets. In terms of positioning and navigation, to tackle the challenges of sound-ray bending in the deep sea and error divergence in inertial navigation systems, adaptive sound-speed correction and deep fusion of multi-source integrated navigation have significantly improved the continuity and accuracy of dynamic positioning. In terms of underwater acoustic communications, to combat extremely narrow bandwidths and severe multipath interference, advances in spread-spectrum systems and coherent equalization have effectively ensured reliable control and data feedback, while accelerating the transition toward networked collaboration. On this basis, the paper analyzes the practical requirements of China’s deep-sea test sites and the bottlenecks confronting underwater acoustic measurement and control technologies. It proposes that future development should advance toward cognitive, integrated, and digital systems. By leveraging emerging technologies—such as AI-enabled capabilities, integrated communications and navigation, and digital twins—it is expected to overcome the constraints imposed by the deep-sea environment, thereby providing robust support for building an efficient marine Internet of Things and for the sustainable exploitation of deep-sea resources.