An implementation perspective on wavefronts and stacking

What is it about?

Controlled-source seismic data is redundant and the usually dense surface coverage with sources and receivers permits the systematic tracking of emerging wavefronts. These wavefronts can be characterized through coherence analysis, a strategy that, depending on the implementation, often employs summation accross traces in the multi-coverage data volume. A broad range of traveltime approximations is available, with subtle but important differences in mathematical shape and parameterization. We compare these descriptions systematically using the same implementation and the same competitive field dataset and find that in this general framework, one particular approximation seems to combine the virtues of accuracy and computational efficiency, which is why we suggest its further use in future studies.

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Why is it important?

Previous investigations were based on different implementations, different parameterizations or targetted datasets of different complexity, which made the virtues of these approximations hardly accessible nor comparable. This work aims at filling this gap, in that it provides a maximally fair comparison on "neutral ground", which led us to conclude that one particular approximation should be used in the future.