Petroleum Geophysics Short Courses

graduate

 

Seismic Wave and Ray Theory
  Instructor Tuition

Dr. Jerry Schuster
University of Houston

$2000


Course description

This course presents fundamental concepts and foundations of wave and ray theory necessary for seismic processing, imaging, AVO analysis and structural interpretation. Many of these concepts are reinforced by MATLAB exercises.


Course outline

  • Elastic and acoustic wave theory, the wave equation, body waves. Reflection + transmission coefficients for a 2-layer medium, Fermat's principle, Snell's law, and Huygen's principle.
  • Partitioning at an interface, reflection at non normal incidence (AVO), reflection geometry, and wave path curvature.
  • Surface waves, attenuation and diffractions.
  • Head waves, Rayleigh resolution, wavelet shape, near surface properties.
  • S-waves and converted waves
  • Basics of Green's theorem, prestack and poststack modeling/migration. Finite-difference method.
  • Wave theory concepts in processing, migration and imaging.
  • Eikonal equation, rays, travel times, and tomography.