Application of Riemannian Seismic Ray Path Tracing in Salt Dome Prospecting

Abstract

Within the geophysical exploration utilising seismic methods, it is well known that if the explored distances are much greater than the wavelength of the seismic waves with which the exploration is carried out, the ray approach of the wave theory can be used. In this way, when the rays travel through an inhomogeneous medium, they follow curved trajectories, which is imperative to determine the geological features that produce reflection and refraction phenomena. In this paper, a simple algorithm for the calculation of the trajectory of a seismic beam through an inhomogeneous stratum is presented. For this, the construction of a pseudo-Riemannian metric is required from the function of P-wave velocities of the geological stratum. Thus, the problem is inverted because instead of finding the curved trajectory of the seismic beam in a background with a Euclidean metric, it is proposed that the beam follows a geodesic of a curved space-time specific to each stratum, becoming a simple and automatic process using the differential geometry apparatus. For the reader to gain insight into this tool, different geological setups from idealised ones up to a salt dome are presented.