Identifying multiply scattered wavepaths in strongly scattering and dispersive media

The ability to extract information from scattered waves is usually limited to singly scattered energy even if multiple scattering might occur in the medium. As a result, the information in arrival times of higher-order scattered events is underexplored. This information is extracted using fingerprinting theory. This theory has never previously been applied successfully to real measurements, particularly when the medium is dispersive. The theory is used to estimate the arrival times and scattering paths of multiply scattered waves in a thin sheet using an automated scheme in a dispersive medium by applying an additional dispersion compensation method. Estimated times and paths are compared with predictions based on a sequence of straight ray paths for each scattering event given the known scatterer locations. Additionally, numerical modelling is performed to verify the interpretations of the compensated data. Since the source also acts as a scatterer in these experiments, initially, the predictions and the numerical results did not conform to the experimental observations. By reformulating the theory and the processing scheme and adding a source scatterer in the modelling, it is shown that predictions of all observed scattering events are possible with both prediction methods, verifying that the methods are both effective and practically achievable.