Northrop Grumman Corporation has delivered the first shipset of the Light Weight Wide Aperture Array (LWWAA) hardware for Block IV of the Virginia-class submarine (VCS) to the U.S. Navy. The set of large array panels can be mounted on either side of the submarine to provide sonar sensor input to the vessel's combat system. Instead of traditional ceramic hydrophone sensors, the LWWAA uses fiber optic acoustic sensor technology to convert a target submarine's acoustic energy in the water into information that can be used to identify and track it.
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