Objectives  Synthetic aperture sonar (SAS) is one kind of high resolution underwater imaging sonar. Its principle is to use small array to simulate large aperture array by uniforming linear motion along the direction of flight track, and realize coherent processing of echo signal to obtain high resolution two-dimensional sonar image, which is independent of imaging distance and acoustic wavelength. The back projection algorithm is an accurate point-by-point imaging algorithm, which is characterized by accurate focusing ability, suitable for wide beam and large scene imaging, and easy to realize motion compensation, but it has the disadvantages of low computational efficiency. In recent years, with the development of computer technology, especially the appearance of graphics processor unit, it has powerful computing power and provides a new way to accelerate the back projection algorithm.

  Methods  We propose a fast accurate back projection algorithm for multi-receiver SAS in heterogeneous environment. On the basis of analyzing the principle of accurate back-projection imaging algorithm, the pulse compression and time-consuming azimuth accumulation are transformed into a single instruction multi-threaded mode, and the imaging process is accelerated by the powerful multi-core computing ability of graphics processor unit.

  Results  The validity and efficiency of the proposed fast imaging algorithm are verified by the imaging experiments performed on simulated and real SAS data. Compared with the serial imaging algorithm, its acceleration ratio is as high as 326.3 and 333.6. For large-scale data imaging processing, it shows excellent acceleration performance.

  Conclusions  The proposed back projection imaging algorithm greatly improves the imaging efficiency and meets the needs of real-time SAS imaging, which lays the foundation for subsequent motion compensation.