Efficient depth extrapolation of waves in elastic isotropic media
For geophysicists and seismic processors, this method reduces the cost of elastic modeling, potentially enabling multicomponent elastic modeling to become standard in seismic processing workflows.
The paper proposes a computationally efficient technique for extrapolating seismic waves in isotropic elastic media, achieving significant cost reduction compared to time- and frequency-domain methods. The method extrapolates displacement fields for both pressure and shear waves.
We propose a computationally efficient technique for extrapolating seismic waves in an arbitrary isotropic elastic medium. The method is based on factorizing the full elastic wave equation into a product of pseudo-differential operators. The method extrapolates displacement fields, hence can be used for modeling both pressure and shear waves. The proposed method can achieve a significant reduction in the cost of elastic modeling compared to the currently prevalent time- and frequency-domain numeric modeling methods and can contribute to making multicomponent elastic modeling part of the standard seismic processing work flow.