Seismic Data Processing and Interpretation on the Loess Plateau, Part 2： Seismic Data Interpretation

The loess plateau covering the North Shaanxi slope and Tianhuan depression consists of a regional monocline, high in the east and low in the west, with dips of less than 1^0, Structural movement in this region was weak so that faults and local structures were not well developed. As a result, numerous wide and gentle noses and small traps with magnitudes less than 50 m were developed on the large westward-dipping monocline. Reservoirs, including Mesozoic oil reservoirs and Paleozoic gas reservoirs in the Ordos Basin, are dominantly lithologic with a small number of structural reservoirs. Single reservoirs are characterized as thin with large lateral variations, strong anisotropy, low porosity, low permeability, and low richness. A series of approaches for predicting reservoir thickness, physical properties, and hydrocarbon potential of subtle lithologic reservoirs was established based on the interpretation of erosion surfaces.     

Erythemal UV observations at Belsk,Poland, in the period 1976–2008: Data homogenization,climatology, and trends

Measurements of erythemal irradiance have been carried out continuously at Belsk since May 1975. We present a homogenization procedure of the UV time series for the period of 1976–2008. Long-term oscillations discovered in the homogenized data set agree with those extracted from the reconstructed UV data for all-sky and clear-sky conditions. The UV climatology was established and the UV variability was determined. Positive UV trends were found for the period of 1976-2008 in the annual mean (5.6±0.9% per decade), in the seasonal mean for the warm subperiod of the year (April–October, 5.5±1.0% per decade), and in monthly means (∼2–9% per decade). A satisfactory agreement between the trend extracted from the homogenized ground-based data and that found in satellite UV data for Belsk (1979–2008) supports the reliability of satellite trend analyses over wider areas during snowless periods.     

Book Review: Monitoring the Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty: Data Processing and Infrasound by Zoltan A. Der,Robert H. Shumway and Eugene T. Herrin (Eds.), Birkhäuser Verlag,Basel-Boston-Berlin, 2002, ISBN 3-7643-6676-1

Studia Geophysica et Geodaetica -     

Study and Practice of Wide-Angle Seismic Data Processing

This paper presents the special processing methods used for wide-angle land seismic data through both theoretical study and model testing. They are different from conventional ones in the following aspects: separation of reflection and refraction waves, long offset NMO and stacking and forward modeling and inversion. These processing techniques have been applied for the first time to land seismic data from Liaohe areas, resulting in greatly improved quality of the deep formation and better imaging of the shallow layer obtained in the volcanic-shielded area. Wide-angle reflection and refraction seismic surveys were carried out in the Liaohe area using the maximum offset of 6500m and with the target around 2000ms. In the processing, we adopted the τ-p transform and the high-order normal moveout correction.     

The Analysis of Seismic Data Structure and Oil and Gas Prediction

In this paper, a new concept called numerical structure of seismic data is introduced and the difference between numerical structure and numerical value of seismic data is explained. Our study shows that the numerical seismic structure is closely related to oil and gas-bearing reservoir,so it is very useful for a geologist or a geophysicist to precisely interpret the oil-bearing layers from the seismic data. This technology can be applied to any exploration or production stage. The new method has been tested on a series of exploratory or development wells and proved to be reliable in China. Hydrocarbon-detection with this new method for 39 exploration wells on 25 structures indicates a success ratio of over 80 percent. The new method of hydrocarbon prediction can be applied for: (1) depositional environment of reservoirs with marine facies, delta, or non-marine facies (including fluvial facies, lacustrine facies); (2) sedimentary rocks of reservoirs that are non-marine clastic rocks and carbonate rock; and (3) burial depths range from 300 m to 7000 m, and the minimum thickness of these reservoirs is over 8 m (main frequency is about 50 Hz).     

Comprehensive Interpretation Technique for Geophysical Data and Its Applications

Addressed in this paper was the comprehensive interpretation of all kinds of data and its applications in oil/gas exploration. Real examples were used to illustrate the importance of the comprehensive interpretation of gravity/magnetic/electric/seismic data as well as the results.     

The Hulopoe Gravel,Lanai, Hawaii: New Sedimentological Data and their Bearing on the “Giant Wave” (Mega-Tsunami) Emplacement Hypothesis

—Recognition that many oceanic islands are shaped by giant landslides has highlighted claims that the Hulopoe Gravel on south Lanai, Hawaii, was deposited by giant waves (mega-tsunami) generated by such a landslide. This interpretation is controversial. Resolution of the controversy has global implications because mass wasting of oceanic islands has been a common process for as long as hot spot volcanism has affected the ocean basins. Thus, if mega-tsunami are attendant upon the mass wasting process, their effect on earth surface processes should be discernible for much of geological time and may be comparable to that resulting from bolide impacts that form astroblemes.¶Detailed facies analysis of the pebble, cobble and boulder gravels that form the Hulopoe Gravel type section shows that the gravels are composed predominantly of basalt clasts with appreciable amounts of limestone clasts in 8 of the 14 beds present. Deposition was not continuous: eight disconformities are recognized in the 9.2 m type section, three of which are associated with truncated paleosols. The Hulopoe Gravel was not deposited by a single tsunami at 105 ka, as has been proposed. One bed is clearly an alluvial deposit. The origins of others are unclear but the facies data do not exclude tsunami as one of the processes that deposited individual beds within the Hulopoe Gravel, either above or below sea level.     

On Earth’s Mantle Constitution and Structure from Joint Analysis of Geophysical and Laboratory-Based Data: An Example

Determining Earth’s structure is a fundamental goal of Earth science, and geophysical methods play a prominent role in investigating Earth’s interior. Geochemical, cosmochemical, and petrological analyses of terrestrial samples and meteoritic material provide equally important insights. Complementary information comes from high-pressure mineral physics and chemistry, i.e., use of sophisticated experimental techniques and numerical methods that are capable of attaining or simulating physical properties at very high pressures and temperatures, thereby allowing recovered samples from Earth’s crust and mantle to be analyzed in the laboratory or simulated computationally at the conditions that prevail in Earth’s mantle and core. This is particularly important given that the vast bulk of Earth’s interior is geochemically unsampled. This paper describes a quantitative approach that combines data and results from mineral physics, petrological analyses of mantle minerals, and geophysical inverse calculations, in order to map geophysical data directly for mantle composition (major element chemistry and water content) and thermal state. We illustrate the methodology by inverting a set of long-period electromagnetic response functions beneath six geomagnetic stations that cover a range of geological settings for major element chemistry, water content, and thermal state of the mantle. The results indicate that interior structure and constitution of the mantle can be well-retrieved given a specific set of measurements describing (1) the conductivity of mantle minerals, (2) the partitioning behavior of water between major upper mantle and transition-zone minerals, and (3) the ability of nominally anhydrous minerals to store water in their crystal structures. Specifically, upper mantle water contents determined here bracket the ranges obtained from analyses of natural samples, whereas transition-zone water concentration is an order-of-magnitude greater than that of the upper mantle and appears to vary laterally underneath the investigated locations.     

Introduction to “Tsunami Science Four Years After the 2004 Indian Ocean Tsunami, Part II: Observation and Data Analysis”

In this introduction we briefly summarize the fourteen contributions to Part II of this special issue on Tsunami Science Four Years After the 2004 Indian Ocean Tsunami. These papers are representative of the new tsunami science being conducted since the occurrence of that tragic event. Most of these were presented at the session: Tsunami Generation and Hazard, of the International Union of Geodesy and Geophysics XXIV General Assembly held at Perugia, Italy, in July of 2007. That session included over one hundred presentations on a wide range of topics in tsunami research. The papers grouped into Part II, and introduced here, cover field observations of recent tsunami’s, modern studies of historical events, coastal sea-level observations and case studies in tsunami data analysis.     

Tide−Tsunami Interaction in Columbia River, as Implied by Historical Data and Numerical Simulations

The East Japan tsunami of 11 March 2011 propagated more than 100 km upstream in the Columbia River. Visual analysis of its records along the river suggests that the tsunami propagation was strongly affected by tidal conditions. A numerical model of the lower Columbia River populated with tides and a downstream current was developed. Simulations of the East Japan tsunami propagating up the tidal river reproduced the observed features of tsunami waveform transformation, which did not emerge in simulations of the same wave propagating in a quiescent-state river. This allows us to clearly attribute those features to nonlinear interaction with the tidal river environment. The simulation also points to possible amplification of a tsunami wave crest propagating right after the high tide, previously deduced from the recordings of the 1964 Alaska tsunami in the river.     

Flow–plant interactions at leaf,stem and shoot scales: drag,turbulence, and biomechanics

Flow–plant interactions are experimentally investigated at leaf, stem, and shoot scales in an open-channel flume at a range of Reynolds numbers. The experiments included measurements of instantaneous drag forces acting on leaves, stems, and shoots of the common freshwater plant species Glyceria fluitans, complemented with velocity measurements, high-resolution video recordings, and biomechanical tests of leaf and stem properties. The analyses of bulk statistics, power spectral densities, transfer functions, and cross-correlations of measured velocities and drag forces revealed that flow characteristics, drag force, and plant biomechanical and morphological properties are strongly interconnected and scale-dependent. The plant element–flow interactions can be subdivided into two classes: (I) passive interactions when the drag variability is due to the time variability of the wetted and frontal areas and squared approach velocity (due to the large-scale turbulence); and (II) active interactions representing a range of element-specific instabilities that depend on the element flexural rigidity and morphology. Implications of experimental findings for plant biophysics and ecology are briefly discussed.