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- Volume 37, Issue 8, 1989
Geophysical Prospecting - Volume 37, Issue 8, 1989
Volume 37, Issue 8, 1989
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AUTOMATIC EDITING OF NOISY SEISMIC DATA1
Authors RICHARD G. ANDERSON and GEORGE A. McMECHANABSTRACTSeismic data often contain traces that are dominated by noise; these traces should be removed (edited) before multichannel filtering or stacking. Noise bursts and spikes should be edited before single channel filtering. Spikes can be edited using a running median filter with a threshold; noise bursts can be edited by comparing the amplitudes of each trace to those of traces that are nearby in offset‐common midpoint space. Relative amplitude decay rates of traces are diagnostic of their signal‐to‐noise (S/N) ratios and can be used to define trace editing criteria. The relative amplitude decay rate is calculated by comparing the time‐gated trace amplitudes to a control function that is the median trace amplitude as a function of time, offset, and common midpoint. The editing threshold is set using a data‐adaptive procedure that analyses a histogram of the amplitude decay rates.
A performance evaluation shows that the algorithm makes slightly fewer incorrect trace editing decisions than human editors. The procedure for threshold setting achieves a good balance between preserving the fold of the data and removing the noisiest traces. Tests using a synthetic seismic line show that the relative amplitude decay rates are diagnostic of the traces’S/N ratios. However, the S/N ratios cannot be accurately usefully estimated at the start of processing, where noisy‐trace editing is most needed; this is the fundamental limit to the accuracy of noisy trace editing.
When trace equalization is omitted from the processing flow (as in amplitude‐versus‐offset analysis), precise noisy‐trace editing is critical. The S/N ratio of the stack is more sensitive to type 2 errors (failing to reject noisy traces) than it is to type 1 errors (rejecting good traces). However, as the fold of the data decreases, the S/N ratio of the stack becomes increasingly sensitive to type 1 errors.
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APPLICATION OF ELASTIC MODELLING IN PROCESSING AND INTERPRETATION OF VSP DATA: A CASE HISTORY1
By F. AMINZADEHABSTRACTData from offshore Norway is used to study applications of elastic VSP modelling in detecting shear waves and observing the effects of successive mode conversion in field‐recorded VSP data. The shear‐wave velocities and densities from log data are used in conjunction with compressional wave velocities determined from surface seismic and log data in the VSP modelling.
The time domain non‐normal incidence elastic VSP modelling technique of Aminzadeh and Mendel is used as the modelling algorithm. Two surface seismograms are computed first. One is the vertical component and the other is the horizontal component for plane waves that have specified incident angles. A downward continuation method is then applied to generate seismograms at different depth points. The collection of these seismograms constitutes non‐normal incidence VSPs. Both vertical and horizontal components of VSP data can be obtained by this procedure.
In this paper non‐normal incidence VSPs are generated for a 12.5° incident plane wave. The modelling results of layered earth systems of thin layers and thick layers are both compared with field data, and the effect of mode conversions in thin layers is observed. Several events in the field data can be explained by this elastic VSP modelling.
Comparison of the model data and field data enabled a probable tube wave or out‐of‐plane event to be identified, the removal of which significantly improved the final VSP section. This study also shows how the VSP data helped the interpretation of the surface 3D data.
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ON THE ROLE OF PARTIAL RAY EXPANSION IN THE COMPUTATION OF RAY SYNTHETIC SEISMOGRAMS FOR LAYERED STRUCTURES1
Authors J. D. COVEY, F. HRON and K. L. PEACOCKABSTRACTThis paper presents results of testing an efficient ray generation scheme needed whenever ray synthetic seismograms are to be computed for layered models with more than 10‘ thick’layers. Our ray generation algorithm is based on the concept of kinematically equivalent waves (the kinematic analogs) having identical traveltimes along different ray‐paths between the source and the receiver, both located on the surface of the model. These waves, existing in any medium composed of laterally homogeneous parallel layers, interfere at any location along the recording surface, thereby producing a composite wavelet whose amplitude and shape depend directly on the number of kinematic analogs (the multiplicity factor). Hence, explicit knowledge of the multiplicity factor is crucial for any analysis based on the amplitude and shape of individual wavelets, such as wavelet shaping, Q estimation, or linearized wavelet inversion.
For unconverted waves, such as those discussed in this paper, the multiplicity factor can be computed analytically using formulae given in the Appendix; for converted waves, the multiplicity factor should be computed numerically, using the algorithm employed for the computation of the seismograms presented in a previous paper by one of the authors.
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3D TABLE‐DRIVEN MIGRATION1
Authors G. BLACQUIÈRE, H. W. J. DEBEYE, C. P. A. WAPENAAR and A. J. BERKHOUTABSTRACTAn efficient full 3D wavefield extrapolation technique is presented. The method can be used for any type of subsurface structure and the degree of accuracy and dip‐angle performance are user‐defined. The extrapolation is performed in the space‐frequency domain as a space‐dependent spatial convolution with recursive Kirchhoff extrapolation operators.
To get a high level of efficiency the operators are optimized such that they have the smallest possible size for a specified accuracy and dip‐angle performance. As both accuracy and maximum dip‐angle are input parameters for the operator calculation, the method offers the possibility of a trade‐off between these quantities and efficiency. The operators are calculated in advance and stored in a table for a range of wavenumbers. Once they have been calculated they can be used many times.
At the basis of the operator design is the well‐known phase‐shift operator. Although this operator is exact for homogeneous media only, it is assumed that it may be applied locally in case of inhomogeneities. Lateral velocity variations can then be handled by choosing the extrapolation operator according to the local value of the velocity. Optionally the operators can be designed such that they act as spatially variant high‐cut filters. This means that the evanescent field can be suppressed in one pass with the extrapolation. The extrapolation method can be used both in prestack and post‐stack applications. In this paper we use it in zero‐offset migration. Tests on 2D and 3D synthetic and 2D real data show the excellent quality of the method. The full 3D result is much better then the result of two‐pass migration, which has been applied to the same data.
The implementation yields a code that is fully vectorizable, which makes the method very suitable for vector computers.
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ESTIMATION OF THE DEGREE OF POLYNOMIAL FITTED TO GRAVITY ANOMALIES AND ITS APPLICATION1
By HUALIN ZENGABSTRACTA method for estimating the degree of polynomial fitted to gravity anomalies to evaluate the regional anomaly is presented. The anomaly can be fitted by polynomials of different degrees with the least‐squares method and the optimum degree of the polynomial evaluating this anomaly can be estimated from the point of discontinuity of the gradient on a graph of variance against the polynomial degree. The Bouguer gravity is initially separated by upward continuation to a proper height and then the degree of regional polynomial to fit the Bouguer anomaly can be estimated. Theoretical and field examples show the effectiveness of the method.
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ACHIEVEMENTS IN COPPER SULPHIDE EXPLORATION IN ALBANIA WITH IP AND EM METHODS1
Authors L. LANGORE, P. ALIKAJ and D. GJOVREKUABSTRACTThe copper sulphide exploration programme in Albania involves a number of geophysical methods. The most important ones are the Induced Polarization (IP) and the Turam methods. This paper reports some recent achievements in increasing the depth of investigation and in discriminating sulphide ore textures by the IP, spectral IP and Turam methods.
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