Multiple level-set joint inversion of traveltime and gravity data with application to ore delineation: A synthetic study

Geophysics ◽  
2018 ◽  
Vol 83 (1) ◽  
pp. R13-R30 ◽  
Author(s):  
Polina Zheglova ◽  
Peter G. Lelièvre ◽  
Colin G. Farquharson

We have developed a multiple level-set method for simultaneous inversion of gravity and seismic traveltime data. The method recovers the boundaries between regions with distinct physical properties assumed constant and known, creating structurally consistent models of two subsurface properties: P-wave velocity and density. In single level-set methods, only two rock units can be considered: background and inclusion. Such methods have been applied to examples representing various geophysical scenarios, including in the context of joint inversion. In multiple level-set methods, several units can be considered, which make them far more applicable to real earth scenarios. Recently, a multiple level-set method has been proposed for inversion of magnetic data. We extend the multiple level-set formulation to joint inversion of gravity and traveltime data, improving upon previous work, and we investigate applicability of such an inversion method in ore delineation. In mineral exploration environments, traditional seismic imaging and inversion methods are challenging because of the small target size and the specific physical property contrasts involved. First-arrival seismic traveltime and gravity data complement each other, and we found that joint multiple level-set inversion is more beneficial than separate inversions, especially with limited data and slow targets. Our method is more robust than the joint inversion method based on clustering of physical properties in recovery of piecewise homogeneous models not well-constrained by the data. To justify the known property assumption, we found the degree of robustness of the multiple level-set joint inversion to uncertainties arising from incomplete knowledge of small-scale subsurface physical property variations and target composition.

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Wenbin Li ◽  
Wangtao Lu ◽  
Jianliang Qian ◽  
Yaoguo Li

2020 ◽  
Vol 8 (4) ◽  
pp. SS47-SS62
Author(s):  
Thibaut Astic ◽  
Dominique Fournier ◽  
Douglas W. Oldenburg

We have carried out petrophysically and geologically guided inversions (PGIs) to jointly invert airborne and ground-based gravity data and airborne magnetic data to recover a quasi-geology model of the DO-27 kimberlite pipe in the Tli Kwi Cho (also referred to as TKC) cluster. DO-27 is composed of three main kimberlite rock types in contact with each other and embedded in a granitic host rock covered by a thin layer of glacial till. The pyroclastic kimberlite (PK), which is diamondiferous, and the volcanoclastic kimberlite (VK) have anomalously low density, due to their high porosity, and weak magnetic susceptibility. They are indistinguishable from each other based upon their potential-field responses. The hypabyssal kimberlite (HK), which is not diamondiferous, has been identified as highly magnetic and remanent. Quantitative petrophysical signatures for each rock unit are obtained from sample measurements, such as the increasing density of the PK/VK unit with depth and the remanent magnetization of the HK unit, and are represented as a Gaussian mixture model (GMM). This GMM guides the PGI toward generating a 3D quasi-geology model with physical properties that satisfies the geophysical data sets and the petrophysical signatures. Density and magnetization models recovered individually yield volumes that have physical property combinations that do not conform to any known petrophysical characteristics of the rocks in the area. A multiphysics PGI addresses this problem by using the GMM as a coupling term, but it puts a volume of the PK/VK unit at a location that is incompatible with geologic information from drillholes. To conform to that geologic knowledge, a fourth unit is introduced, PK-minor, which is petrophysically and geographically distinct from the main PK/VK unit. This inversion produces a quasi-geology model that presents good structural locations of the diamondiferous PK unit and can be used to provide a resource estimate or decide the locations of future drillholes.


Geophysics ◽  
2017 ◽  
Vol 82 (5) ◽  
pp. J61-J81 ◽  
Author(s):  
Wenbin Li ◽  
Wangtao Lu ◽  
Jianliang Qian ◽  
Yaoguo Li

We have developed a multiple level-set method for inverting magnetic data produced by weak induced magnetization only. The method is designed to deal with a specific class of 3D magnetic inverse problems in which the magnetic susceptibility is known and the objective of the inversion is to find the boundary or geometric shape of the causative bodies. We adopt the conceptual representation of the subsurface geologic structure by a set of magnetic bodies, each having a uniform magnetic susceptibility embedded in a nonmagnetic background. This representation enables us to reformulate the magnetic inverse problem into a domain inverse problem for those unknown domains defining the supports of the magnetic causative bodies. Because each body may take on a variety of shapes, and we may not know the number of bodies a priori either, we use multiple level-set functions to parameterize these domains so that the domain inverse problem can be further reduced to an optimization problem of multiple level-set functions. To efficiently compute gradients of the nonlinear functional arising from the multiple level-set formulation, we take advantage of the rapid decay of the magnetic kernels with distance to significantly speed up the matrix-vector multiplications in the minimization process. We apply the new method to the synthetic and field data sets and determine its effectiveness.


2018 ◽  
Vol 54 (3) ◽  
pp. 1-4 ◽  
Author(s):  
Kyung Sik Seo ◽  
Kang Hyouk Lee ◽  
Il Han Park

Geophysics ◽  
2019 ◽  
Vol 84 (5) ◽  
pp. G55-G73
Author(s):  
Guanghui Huang ◽  
Xinming Zhang ◽  
Jianliang Qian

We have developed a novel Kantorovich-Rubinstein (KR) norm-based misfit function to measure the mismatch between gravity-gradient data for the inverse gradiometry problem. Under the assumption that an anomalous mass body has an unknown compact support with a prescribed constant value of density contrast, we implicitly parameterize the unknown mass body by a level-set function. Because the geometry of an underlying anomalous mass body may experience various changes during inversion in terms of level-set evolution, the classic least-squares ([Formula: see text]-norm-based) and the [Formula: see text]-norm-based misfit functions for governing the level-set evolution may potentially induce local minima if an initial guess of the level-set function is far from that of the target model. The KR norm from the optimal transport theory computes the data misfit by comparing the modeled data and the measured data in a global manner, leading to better resolution of the differences between the inverted model and the target model. Combining the KR norm with the level-set method yields a new effective methodology that is not only able to mitigate local minima but is also robust against random noise for the inverse gradiometry problem. Numerical experiments further demonstrate that the new KR norm-based misfit function is able to recover deep dipping flanks of SEG/EAGE salt models even at extremely low signal-to-noise ratios. The new methodology can be readily applied to gravity and magnetic data as well.


2013 ◽  
Vol 2013 ◽  
pp. 1-13 ◽  
Author(s):  
Huiyan Jiang ◽  
Hanqing Tan ◽  
Hiroshi Fujita

This paper proposes a novel semiautomatic method to extract the pancreas from abdominal CT images. Traditional level set and region growing methods that request locating initial contour near the final boundary of object have problem of leakage to nearby tissues of pancreas region. The proposed method consists of a customized fast-marching level set method which generates an optimal initial pancreas region to solve the problem that the level set method is sensitive to the initial contour location and a modified distance regularized level set method which extracts accurate pancreas. The novelty in our method is the proper selection and combination of level set methods, furthermore an energy-decrement algorithm and an energy-tune algorithm are proposed to reduce the negative impact of bonding force caused by connected tissue whose intensity is similar with pancreas. As a result, our method overcomes the shortages of oversegmentation at weak boundary and can accurately extract pancreas from CT images. The proposed method is compared to other five state-of-the-art medical image segmentation methods based on a CT image dataset which contains abdominal images from 10 patients. The evaluated results demonstrate that our method outperforms other methods by achieving higher accuracy and making less false segmentation in pancreas extraction.


Author(s):  
Long Jiang ◽  
Shikui Chen ◽  
Xiangmin Jiao

The parametric level set method is an extension of the conventional level set methods for topology optimization. By parameterizing the level set function, conventional levels let methods can be easily coupled with mathematical programming to achieve better numerical robustness and computational efficiency. Furthermore, the parametric level set scheme not only can inherit the original advantages of the conventional level set methods, such as clear boundary representation and high topological changes handling flexibility but also can alleviate some un-preferred features from the conventional level set methods, such as needing re-initialization. However, in the RBF-based parametric level set method, it was difficult to determine the range of the design variables. Moreover, with the mathematically driven optimization process, the level set function often results in significant fluctuations during the optimization process. This brings difficulties in both numerical stability control and material property interpolation. In this paper, an RBF partition of unity collocation method is implemented to create a new type of kernel function termed as the Cardinal Basis Function (CBF), which employed as the kernel function to parameterize the level set function. The advantage of using the CBF is that the range of the design variable, which was the weight factor in conventional RBF, can be explicitly specified. Additionally, a distance regularization energy functional is introduced to maintain a desired distance regularized level set function evolution. With this desired distance regularization feature, the level set evolution is stabilized against significant fluctuations. Besides, the material property interpolation from the level set function to the finite element model can be more accurate.


2011 ◽  
Vol 308-310 ◽  
pp. 1046-1049 ◽  
Author(s):  
Yu Wang ◽  
Zhen Luo

This paper proposes a meshless Galerkin level set method for structural shape and topology optimization of continua. To taking advantage of the implicit free boundary representation scheme, structural design boundary is represented through the introduction of a scalar level set function as its zero level set, to flexibly handle complex shape fidelity and topology changes by maintaining concise and smooth interface. Compactly supported radial basis functions (CSRBFs) are used to parameterize the level set function and also to construct the shape functions for mesh free function approximation. The meshless Galerkin global weak formulation is employed to implement the discretization of the state equations. This provides a pathway to simplify two numerical procedures involved in most conventional level set methods in propagating the discrete level set functions and in approximating the discrete equations, by unifying the two different stages at two sets of grids just in terms of one set of scattered nodes. The proposed level set method has the capability of describing the implicit moving boundaries without remeshing for discontinuities. The motion of the free boundary is just a question of advancing the discrete level set function by finding the design variables of the size optimization in time. One benchmark example is used to demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed method. The numerical results showcase that this method has the ability to simplify numerical procedures and to avoid numerical difficulties happened in most conventional level set methods. It is straightforward to apply the present method to more advanced shape and topology optimization problems.


Geophysics ◽  
2021 ◽  
pp. 1-76
Author(s):  
Jérémie Giraud ◽  
Mark Lindsay ◽  
Mark Jessell

We present an inversion method for the recovery of the geometry of an arbitrary number of geological units using a regularized least-squares framework. The method addresses cases where each geological unit can be modeled using a constant physical property. Each geological unit or group assigned with the same physical property value is modeled using the signed-distance to its interface with other units. We invert for this quantity and recover the location of interfaces between units using the level-set method. We formulate and solve the inverse problem in a least-squares sense by inverting for such signed-distances. The sensitivity matrix to perturbations of the interfaces is obtained using the chain rule and model mapping from the signed-distance is used to recover physical properties. Exploiting the flexibility of the framework we develop allows any number of rocks units to be considered. In addition, it allows the design and use of regularization incorporating prior information to encourage specific features in the inverted model. We apply this general inversion approach to gravity data favoring minimum adjustments of the interfaces between rock units to fit the data. The method is first tested using noisy synthetic data generated for a model comprised of six distinct units and several scenarios are investigated. It is then applied to field data from the Yerrida Basin (Australia) where we investigate the geometry of a prospective greenstone belt. The synthetic example demonstrates the proof-of-concept of the proposed methodology, while the field application provides insights into, and potential re-interpretation of, the tectonic setting of the area.


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