Downward continuation and geoid determination based on band-limited airborne gravity data

 The downward continuation of the harmonic disturbing gravity potential, derived at flight level from discrete observations of airborne gravity by the spherical Hotine integral, to the geoid is discussed. The initial-boundary-value approach, based on both the direct and inverse solution to Dirichlet's problem of potential theory, is used. Evaluation of the discretized Fredholm integral equation of the first kind and its inverse is numerically tested using synthetic airborne gravity data. Characteristics of the synthetic gravity data correspond to typical airborne data used for geoid determination today and in the foreseeable future: discrete gravity observations at a mean flight height of 2 to 6 km above mean sea level with minimum spatial resolution of 2.5 arcmin and a noise level of 1.5 mGal. Numerical results for both approaches are presented and discussed. The direct approach can successfully be used for the downward continuation of airborne potential without any numerical instabilities associated with the inverse approach. In addition to these two-step approaches, a one-step procedure is also discussed. This procedure is based on a direct relationship between gravity disturbances at flight level and the disturbing gravity potential at sea level. This procedure provided the best results in terms of accuracy, stability and numerical efficiency. As a general result, numerically stable downward continuation of airborne gravity data can be seen as another advantage of airborne gravimetry in the field of geoid determination. Received: 6 June 2001 / Accepted: 3 January 2002     

A formula for computing the gravity disturbance from the second radial derivative of the disturbing potential

 A formula for computing the gravity disturbance and gravity anomaly from the second radial derivative of the disturbing potential is derived in detail using the basic differential equation with spherical approximation in physical geodesy and the modified Poisson integral formula. The derived integral in the space domain, expressed by a spherical geometric quantity, is then converted to a convolution form in the local planar rectangular coordinate system tangent to the geoid at the computing point, and the corresponding spectral formulae of 1-D FFT and 2-D FFT are presented for numerical computation. Received: 27 December 2000 / Accepted: 3 September 2001     

Two different methods of geoidal height determinations using a spherical harmonic representation of the geopotential, topographic corrections and the height anomaly–geoidal height difference

 It is suggested that a spherical harmonic representation of the geoidal heights using global Earth gravity models (EGM) might be accurate enough for many applications, although we know that some short-wavelength signals are missing in a potential coefficient model. A `direct' method of geoidal height determination from a global Earth gravity model coefficient alone and an `indirect' approach of geoidal height determination through height anomaly computed from a global gravity model are investigated. In both methods, suitable correction terms are applied. The results of computations in two test areas show that the direct and indirect approaches of geoid height determination yield good agreement with the classical gravimetric geoidal heights which are determined from Stokes' formula. Surprisingly, the results of the indirect method of geoidal height determination yield better agreement with the global positioning system (GPS)-levelling derived geoid heights, which are used to demonstrate such improvements, than the results of gravimetric geoid heights at to the same GPS stations. It has been demonstrated that the application of correction terms in both methods improves the agreement of geoidal heights at GPS-levelling stations. It is also found that the correction terms in the direct method of geoidal height determination are mostly similar to the correction terms used for the indirect determination of geoidal heights from height anomalies. Received: 26 July 2001 / Accepted: 21 February 2002     

Topographic effects by the Stokes–Helmert method of geoid and quasi-geoid determinations

The topographic potential and the direct topographic effect on the geoid are presented as surface integrals, and the direct gravity effect is derived as a rigorous surface integral on the unit sphere. By Taylor-expanding the integrals at sea level with respect to topographic elevation (H) the power series of the effects is derived to arbitrary orders. This study is primarily limited to terms of order H ². The limitations of the various effects in the frequently used planar approximations are demonstrated. In contrast, it is shown that the spherical approximation to power H ² leads to a combined topographic effect on the geoid (direct plus indirect effect) proportional to H˜² (where terms of degrees 0 and 1 are missing) of the order of several metres, while the combined topographic effect on the height anomaly vanishes, implying that current frequent efforts to determine the direct effect to this order are not needed. The last result is in total agreement with Bjerhammar's method in physical geodesy. It is shown that the most frequently applied remove–restore technique of topographic masses in the application of Stokes' formula suffers from significant errors both in the terrain correction C (representing the sum of the direct topographic effect on gravity anomaly and the effect of continuing the anomaly to sea level) and in the term t (mainly representing the indirect effect on the geoidal or quasi-geoidal height). Received: 18 August 1998 / Accepted: 4 October 1999     

The exterior Airy/Heiskanen topographic–isostatic gravity potential, anomaly and the effect of analytical continuation in Stokes' formula

This study deals with the external type of topographic–isostatic potential and gravity anomaly and its vertical derivatives, derived from the Airy/Heiskanen model for isostatic compensation. From the first and the second radial derivatives of the gravity anomaly the effect on the geoid is estimated for the downward continuation of gravity to sea level in the application of Stokes' formula. The major and regional effect is shown to be of order H ³ of the topography, and it is estimated to be negligible at sea level and modest for most mountains, but of the order of several metres for the highest and most extended mountain belts. Another, global, effect is of order H but much less significant Received: 3 October 1997 / Accepted: 30 June 1998     

Precise geoid determination over Sweden using the Stokes–Helmert method and improved topographic corrections

 Four different implementations of Stokes' formula are employed for the estimation of geoid heights over Sweden: the Vincent and Marsh (1974) model with the high-degree reference gravity field but no kernel modifications; modified Wong and Gore (1969) and Molodenskii et al. (1962) models, which use a high-degree reference gravity field and modification of Stokes' kernel; and a least-squares (LS) spectral weighting proposed by Sj?berg (1991). Classical topographic correction formulae are improved to consider long-wavelength contributions. The effect of a Bouguer shell is also included in the formulae, which is neglected in classical formulae due to planar approximation. The gravimetric geoid is compared with global positioning system (GPS)-levelling-derived geoid heights at 23 Swedish Permanent GPS Network SWEPOS stations distributed over Sweden. The LS method is in best agreement, with a 10.1-cm mean and ±5.5-cm standard deviation in the differences between gravimetric and GPS geoid heights. The gravimetric geoid was also fitted to the GPS-levelling-derived geoid using a four-parameter transformation model. The results after fitting also show the best consistency for the LS method, with the standard deviation of differences reduced to ±1.1 cm. For comparison, the NKG96 geoid yields a 17-cm mean and ±8-cm standard deviation of agreement with the same SWEPOS stations. After four-parameter fitting to the GPS stations, the standard deviation reduces to ±6.1 cm for the NKG96 geoid. It is concluded that the new corrections in this study improve the accuracy of the geoid. The final geoid heights range from 17.22 to 43.62 m with a mean value of 29.01 m. The standard errors of the computed geoid heights, through a simple error propagation of standard errors of mean anomalies, are also computed. They range from ±7.02 to ±13.05 cm. The global root-mean-square error of the LS model is the other estimation of the accuracy of the final geoid, and is computed to be ±28.6 cm. Received: 15 September 1999 / Accepted: 6 November 2000     

Truncated geoid and gravity inversion for one point-mass anomaly

The truncated geoid, defined by the truncated Stokes' integral transform, an integral convolution of gravity anomalies with the Stokes' function on a spherical cap, is often used as a mathematical tool in geoid computations via Stokes' integral to overcome computational difficulties, particularly the need to integrate over the entire boundary spheroid. The objective of this paper is to demonstrate that the truncated geoid does, besides having mathematical applications, have physical interpretation, and thus may be used in gravity inversion. A very simple model of one point-mass anomaly is chosen and a method for inverting its synthetic gravity field with the use of the truncated geoid is presented. The method of inverting the synthetic field generated by one point-mass anomaly has become fundamental for the authors' inversion studies for sets of point-mass anomalies, which are published in a separate paper. More general applications are currently under investigation. Since an inversion technique for physically meaningful mass distributions based on the truncated geoid has not yet been developed, this work is not related to any of the existing gravity inversion techniques. The inversion for one point mass is based on the onset of the so-called dimple event, which occurs in the sequence of surfaces (or profiles) of the first derivative of the truncated geoid with respect to the truncation parameter (radius of the integration cap), its only free parameter. Computing the truncated geoid at various values of the truncation parameter may be understood as spatial filtering of surface gravity data, a type of weighted spherical windowing method. Studying the change of the truncated geoid represented by its first derivative may be understood as a data enhancement method. The instant of the dimple onset is practically independent of the mass of the point anomaly and linearly dependent on its depth. Received: 26 September 1996 /Accepted: 28 September 1998     

The AUSGeoid98 geoid model of Australia: data treatment, computations and comparisons with GPS-levelling data

 The AUSGeoid98 gravimetric geoid model of Australia has been computed using data from the EGM96 global geopotential model, the 1996 release of the Australian gravity database, a nationwide digital elevation model, and satellite altimeter-derived marine gravity anomalies. The geoid heights are on a 2 by 2 arc-minute grid with respect to the GRS80 ellipsoid, and residual geoid heights were computed using the 1-D fast Fourier transform technique. This has been adapted to include a deterministically modified kernel over a spherical cap of limited spatial extent in the generalised Stokes scheme. Comparisons of AUSGeoid98 with GPS and Australian Height Datum (AHD) heights across the continent give an RMS agreement of ±0.364 m, although this apparently large value is attributed partly to distortions in the AHD. Received: 10 March 2000 / Accepted: 21 February 2001     

Geoid determination with density hypotheses from isostatic models and geological information

 Geoid determination by Stokes's formula requires a complete knowledge of the topographical mass density distribution in order to perform gravity reductions to the geoid boundary. However, deeper masses are also of interest, in order to produce a smooth field of gravity anomalies which will improve results from interpolation procedures. Until now, in most cases a constant mass density has been considered, which is a very rough approximation of reality. The influence on the geoid height coming from different mass density hypotheses given by the isostatic models of Pratt/Hayford, Airy/Heiskanen and Vening Meinesz is studied. Apart from a constant mass density value, additional density information deduced from geological maps and thick sedimentary layers is considered. An overview of how mass density distributions act within Stokes's theory is given. The isostatic models are considered in spherical and planar approximation, as well as with constant and lateral variable mass density of the topographical and deeper masses. Numerical results in a test area in south-west Germany show that the differences in the geoid height due to different density hypotheses can reach a magnitude of more than 1 decimetre, which is not negligible in a precise geoid determination with centimetre accuracy. Received: 7 January 2002 / Accepted: 20 September 2002 M. Kuhn now at: Western Australian Centre for Geodesy, Curtin University of Technology, GPO Box U1987, Perth, WA 6845, Australia Acknowledgements. The author would gratefully thank Prof. Dr.-Ing. B. Heck, who was the supervisor of my PhD thesis, and the second examiner Prof. Dr.-Ing. K.H. Ilk, as well as all other colleagues for their support of this work. Particular thanks go to the Landesvermessungsamt Baden–Württemberg (Survey Department of Baden–Württemberg), Bureau Gravimetrique International (BGI, France) for providing the gravity data and the Geologisches Landesamt Baden–Württemberg (Geological Department of Baden–Württemberg) for providing data and maps of the sediment layers within the Rhine Valley. Grateful thanks goes to Prof. W.E. Featherstone and the reviewers Prof. S.D. Pagiatakis, Dr. U. Marti as well as an unknown reviewer for their helpful comments on this paper.     

Some modifications of Stokes' formula that account for truncation and potential coefficient errors

 Stokes' formula from 1849 is still the basis for the gravimetric determination of the geoid. The modification of the formula, originating with Molodensky, aims at reducing the truncation error outside a spherical cap of integration. This goal is still prevalent among various modifications. In contrast to these approaches, some least-squares types of modification that aim at reducing the truncation error, as well as the error stemming from the potential coefficients, are demonstrated. The least-squares estimators are provided in the two cases that (1) Stokes' kernel is a priori modified (e.g. according to Molodensky's approach) and (2) Stokes' kernel is optimally modified to minimize the global mean square error. Meissl-type modifications are also studied. In addition, the use of a higher than second-degree reference field versus the original (Pizzetti-type) reference field is discussed, and it is concluded that the former choice of reference field implies increased computer labour to achieve the same result as with the original reference field. Received: 14 December 1998 / Accepted: 4 October 1999     

Topographic and atmospheric corrections of gravimetric geoid determination with special emphasis on the effects of harmonics of degrees zero and one

 The topographic and atmospheric effects of gravimetric geoid determination by the modified Stokes formula, which combines terrestrial gravity and a global geopotential model, are presented. Special emphasis is given to the zero- and first-degree effects. The normal potential is defined in the traditional way, such that the disturbing potential in the exterior of the masses contains no zero- and first-degree harmonics. In contrast, it is shown that, as a result of the topographic masses, the gravimetric geoid includes such harmonics of the order of several centimetres. In addition, the atmosphere contributes with a zero-degree harmonic of magnitude within 1 cm. Received: 5 November 1999 / Accepted: 22 January 2001     

重力异常向上延拓严密改化模型及向下延拓应用

重力异常向上延拓全球积分模型在航空重力测量数据质量评估和向下延拓迭代计算等领域具有广泛的应用。为了消除积分核函数奇异性影响,需要对该模型进行基于积分恒等式的移去-恢复转换及全球积分域的分区改化处理。在此过程中,传统改化处理方法往往忽略了全球积分过渡到局域积分引起的积分恒等式偏差影响,从而导致不必要的计算模型误差,最终影响向上延拓计算结果的可靠性,甚至影响向下延拓迭代解算结果的稳定性。针对此问题,本文开展了重力异常向上延拓积分模型改化及向下延拓应用分析研究,依据实测数据保障条件和积分恒等式适用条件要求,导出了重力异常向上延拓积分模型的分步改化公式,提出了补偿传统改化模型缺陷的修正公式,并将最终的严密改化模型应用于重力异常向下延拓迭代解算。使用超高阶地球位模型EGM2008作为标准位场开展数值计算检验,分别对重力异常向上延拓分步改化模型的计算精度及在向下延拓迭代解算中的应用效果进行了检核评估,验证了采用严密改化模型的必要性和有效性。     

New analytical and numerical approaches for geopotential modeling

 The standard analytical approach which is applied for constructing geopotential models OSU86 and earlier ones, is based on reducing the boundary value equation to a sphere enveloping the Earth and then solving it directly with respect to the potential coefficients _n,m . In an alternative procedure, developed by Jekeli and used for constructing the models OSU91 and EGM96, at first an ellipsoidal harmonic series is developed for the geopotential and then its coefficients _n,m ^e are transformed to the unknown _n,m . The second solution is more exact, but much more complicated. The standard procedure is modified and a new simple integral formula is derived for evaluating the potential coefficients. The efficiency of the standard and new procedures is studied numerically. In these solutions the same input data are used as for constructing high-degree parts of the EGM96 models. From two sets of _n,m (n≤360,|m|≤n), derived by the standard and new approaches, different spectral characteristics of the gravity anomaly and the geoid undulation are estimated and then compared with similar characteristics evaluated by Jekeli's approach (`etalon' solution). The new solution appears to be very close to Jekeli's, as opposed to the standard solution. The discrepancies between all the characteristics of the new and `etalon' solutions are smaller than the corresponding discrepancies between two versions of the final geopotential model EGM96, one of them (HDM190) constructed by the block-diagonal least squares (LS) adjustment and the other one (V068) by using Jekeli's approach. On the basis of the derived analytical solution a new simple mathematical model is developed to apply the LS technique for evaluating geopotential coefficients. Received: 12 December 2000 / Accepted: 21 June 2001     

Geoid determination using adapted reference field, seismic Moho depths and variable density contrast

 The traditional remove-restore technique for geoid computation suffers from two main drawbacks. The first is the assumption of an isostatic hypothesis to compute the compensation masses. The second is the double consideration of the effect of the topographic–isostatic masses within the data window through removing the reference field and the terrain reduction process. To overcome the first disadvantage, the seismic Moho depths, representing, more or less, the actual compensating masses, have been used with variable density anomalies computed by employing the topographic–isostatic mass balance principle. In order to avoid the double consideration of the effect of the topographic–isostatic masses within the data window, the effect of these masses for the used fixed data window, in terms of potential coefficients, has been subtracted from the reference field, yielding an adapted reference field. This adapted reference field has been used for the remove–restore technique. The necessary harmonic analysis of the topographic–isostatic potential using seismic Moho depths with variable density anomalies is given. A wide comparison among geoids computed by the adapted reference field with both the Airy–Heiskanen isostatic model and seismic Moho depths with variable density anomaly and a geoid computed by the traditional remove–restore technique is made. The results show that using seismic Moho depths with variable density anomaly along with the adapted reference field gives the best relative geoid accuracy compared to the GPS/levelling geoid. Received: 3 October 2001 / Accepted: 20 September 2002 Correspondence to: H.A. Abd-Elmotaal     

The topographic bias by analytical continuation in physical geodesy

This study emphasizes that the harmonic downward continuation of an external representation of the Earth’s gravity potential to sea level through the topographic masses implies a topographic bias. It is shown that the bias is only dependent on the topographic density along the geocentric radius at the computation point. The bias corresponds to the combined topographic geoid effect, i.e., the sum of the direct and indirect topographic effects. For a laterally variable topographic density function, the combined geoid effect is proportional to terms of powers two and three of the topographic height, while all higher order terms vanish. The result is useful in geoid determination by analytical continuation, e.g., from an Earth gravity model, Stokes’s formula or a combination thereof.     

The northern European geoid: a case study on long-wavelength geoid errors

 The long-wavelength geoid errors on large-scale geoid solutions, and the use of modified kernels to mitigate these effects, are studied. The geoid around the Nordic area, from Greenland to the Ural mountains, is considered. The effect of including additional gravity data around the Nordic/Baltic land area, originating from both marine, satellite and ground-based measurements, is studied. It is found that additional data appear to increase the noise level in computations, indicating the presence of systematic errors. Therefore, the Wong–Gore modification to the Stokes kernel is applied. This method of removing lower-order terms in the Stokes kernel appears to improve the geoid. The best fit to the global positioning system (GPS) leveling points is obtained with a degree of modification of approximately 30. In addition to the study of modification errors, the results of different methods of combining satellite altimetry gravity and other gravimetry are presented. They all gave comparable results, at the 6-cm level, when evaluated for the Nordic GPS networks. One dimensional (1-D) and 2-D fast Fourier transform (FFT) methods are also compared. It is shown that even though methods differ by up to 6 cm, the fit to the GPS is essentially the same. A surprising conclusion is that the addition of more data does not always produce a better geoid, illustrating the danger of systematic errors in data. Received: 4 July 2001 / Accepted: 21 February 2002     

Determination of the boundary values for the Stokes–Helmert problem

 The definition of the mean Helmert anomaly is reviewed and the theoretically correct procedure for computing this quantity on the Earth's surface and on the Helmert co-geoid is suggested. This includes a discussion of the role of the direct topographical and atmospherical effects, primary and secondary indirect topographical and atmospherical effects, ellipsoidal corrections to the gravity anomaly, its downward continuation and other effects. For the rigorous derivations it was found necessary to treat the gravity anomaly systematically as a point function, defined by means of the fundamental gravimetric equation. It is this treatment that allows one to formulate the corrections necessary for computing the `one-centimetre geoid'. Compared to the standard treatment, it is shown that a `correction for the quasigeoid-to-geoid separation', amounting to about 3 cm for our area of interest, has to be considered. It is also shown that the `secondary indirect effect' has to be evaluated at the topography rather than at the geoid level. This results in another difference of the order of several centimetres in the area of interest. An approach is then proposed for determining the mean Helmert anomalies from gravity data observed on the Earth's surface. This approach is based on the widely-held belief that complete Bouguer anomalies are generally fairly smooth and thus particularly useful for interpolation, approximation and averaging. Numerical results from the Canadian Rocky Mountains for all the corrections as well as the downward continuation are shown. Received: 9 March 1998 / Accepted: 16 November 1998     

Altimetry–gravimetry problems with free vertical datum

 The definition and connection of vertical datums in geodetic height networks is a fundamental problem in geodesy. Today, the standard approach to solve it is based on the joint processing of terrestrial and satellite geodetic data. It is generalized to cases where the coverage with terrestrial data may change from region to region, typically across coastlines. The principal difficulty is that such problems, so-called altimetry–gravimetry boundary-value problems (AGPs), do not admit analytical solutions such as Stokes' integral. A numerical solution strategy for the free-datum problem is presented. Analysis of AGPs in spherical and constant radius approximation shows that two of them are mathematically well-posed problems, while the classical AGP-I may be ill posed in special situations. Received: 2 December 1998 / Accepted: 30 November 1999     

Improved convergence rates for the truncation error in gravimetric geoid determination

 When Stokes's integral is used over a spherical cap to compute a gravimetric estimate of the geoid, a truncation error results due to the neglect of gravity data over the remainder of the Earth. Associated with the truncation error is an error kernel defined over these two complementary regions. An important observation is that the rate of decay of the coefficients of the series expansion for the truncation error in terms of Legendre polynomials is determined by the smoothness properties of the error kernel. Previously published deterministic modifications of Stokes's integration kernel involve either a discontinuity in the error kernel or its first derivative at the spherical cap radius. These kernels are generalised and extended by constructing error kernels whose derivatives at the spherical cap radius are continuous up to an arbitrary order. This construction is achieved by smoothly continuing the error kernel function into the spherical cap using a suitable degree polynomial. Accordingly, an improved rate of convergence of the spectral series representation of the truncation error is obtained. Received: 21 April 1998 / Accepted: 4 October 1999     

Local geoid determination combining gravity disturbances and GPS/levelling: a case study in the Lake Nasser area, Aswan, Egypt

 The use of GPS for height control in an area with existing levelling data requires the determination of a local geoid and the bias between the local levelling datum and the one implicitly defined when computing the local geoid. If only scarse gravity data are available, the heights of new data may be collected rapidly by determining the ellipsoidal height by GPS and not using orthometric heights. Hence the geoid determination has to be based on gravity disturbances contingently combined with gravity anomalies. Furthermore, existing GPS/levelling data may also be used in the geoid determination if a suitable general gravity field modelling method (such as least-squares collocation, LSC) is applied. A comparison has been made in the Aswan Dam area between geoids determined using fast Fourier transform (FFT) with gravity disturbances exclusively and LSC using only the gravity disturbances and the disturbances combined with GPS/levelling data. The EGM96 spherical harmonic model was in all cases used in a remove–restore mode. A total of 198 gravity disturbances spaced approximately 3 km apart were used, as well as 35 GPS/levelling points in the vicinity and on the Aswan Dam. No data on the Nasser Lake were available. This gave difficulties when using FFT, which requires the use of gridded data. When using exclusively the gravity disturbances, the agreement between the GPS/levelling data were 0.71 ± 0.17 m for FFT and 0.63 ± 0.15 for LSC. When combining gravity disturbances and GPS/levelling, the LSC error estimate was ±0.10 m. In the latter case two bias parameters had to be introduced to account for a possible levelling datum difference between the levelling on the dam and that on the adjacent roads. Received: 14 August 2000 / Accepted: 28 February 2001