Seismic tomography

Cross-well tomography uses the traveltimes of first arrivals to estimate the velocity model between two wells. If the velocity anomalies are large, ray-bending effects must be considered. In this case, one needs to find the trajectories of rays between each pair of sources and receivers. In Figure , I simulate this situation by tracing rays through a smooth slowness model. The rays start from three sources on the left and end to the uniformly spaced receivers on the right. The velocity variations cause the rays to bend accordingly.

 

tomotrc
Figure 3 Ray tracing from three source on the left to the uniformly spaced receivers on the right. The background shows the slowness model. High intensities denote high velocities or low slowness.