2434-2443Underwater acoustic source localization is important in many underwater applications. However, due to the intensity declination of the acoustic signal as the distance from the source increases, the possibility to detect and localize the source using a single surface platform become harder. This paper presents an underwater acoustic source localization strategy by a group of autonomous surface vehicles (ASVs) using a combined systematic and metaheuristic searching methods. The proposed localization strategy consists of two phases known as a source detection phase (based on a systematic searching method) and a source tracing phase (based on a metaheuristic searching method) implemented when none of the ASVs detect the presents of the acoustic source and when at least one of the ASVs detect the presents of the source, respectively. A formation based and a Particle Swarm Optimization (PSO) is used as a systematic and metaheuristic search method, respectively. The reliability of the proposed localization strategy is demonstrated through a series of a simulation studies
