Empirical Analysis of the Dissipated Acoustic Energy in Wave Breaking

In this research an attempt is made at explaining the physical processes behind energy dissipation during wave breaking, through spectral analysis of the resulting sound. The size of an air bubble can be directly linked to the frequency of the sound that is heard using the simple harmonic solution to the Rayleigh–Plesset equation. It indicates the inverse relationship between frequency and bubble size. And this relationship has been used to identify wave breaking in general [MANASSEH 2006]. Now this research goes a step farther and looks at how the frequency spectrum of the sound changes with time, in an effort to understand the general pattern and from that to deduce an empirical equation that describes the breaking down of turbulence during a wave breaking event.
Two main processes have been identified, with the second process having three main indicators that are necessary to evidence wave breaking. The first process is a near instantaneous shattering of the initial air bubble into much smaller metastable bubbles of a size that appears to be common for all waves independent of wave height. Then in the second process, the bubbles continue to break down following a recognisable pattern.