Seismic coherence is used to detect discontinuities in underground media. However, strata with steeply dipping structures often produce false low coherence estimates and thus incorrect discontinuity characterization results. It is important to eliminate or reduce the effect of dipping on coherence estimates. To solve this problem, time-domain dip scanning is typically used to improve estimation of coherence in areas with steeply dipping structures. However, the accuracy of the time-domain estimation of dip is limited by the sampling interval. In contrast, the spectrum amplitude is not affected by the time delays in adjacent seismic traces caused by dipping structures. We propose a coherency algorithm that uses the spectral amplitudes of seismic traces within a predefined analysis window to construct the covariance matrix. The coherency estimates with the proposed algorithm is defined as the ratio between the dominant the constructed covariance matrix. Thus, we eigenvalue and the sum of all eigenvalues of eliminate the effect of dipping structures on coherency estimates. In addition, because different frequency bands of spectral amplitudes are used to estimate coherency, the proposed algorithm has multiscale features. Low frequencies are effective for characterizing large-scale faults, whereas high frequencies are better in characterizing small-scale faults. Application to synthetic and real seismic data show that the proposed algorithm can eliminate the effect of dip and produce better coherence estimates than conventional coherency algorithms in areas with steeply dipping structures.
Numerical simulations of a seismic wavefield are important to analyze seismic wave propagation. Elastic-wave equations are used in data simulation for modeling migration and imaging. In elastic wavefield numerical modeling, the rotated staggered-grid method （RSM） is a modification of the standard staggered-grid method （SSM）. The variable-order method is based on the method of variable-length spatial operators and wavefield propagation, and it calculates the real dispersion error by adapting different finite-difference orders to different velocities. In this study, the variable-order rotated staggered-grid method （VRSM） is developed after applying the variable-order method to RSM to solve the numerical dispersion problem of RSM in low-velocity regions and reduce the computation cost. Moreover, based on theoretical dispersion and the real dispersion error of wave propagation calculated with the wave separation method, the application of the original method is extended from acoustic to shear waves, and the calculation is modified from theoretical to time-varying values. A layered model and an overthrust model are used to demonstrate the applicability of VRSM. We also evaluate the order distribution, wave propagation, and computation time. The results suggest that the VRSM order distribution is reasonable and VRSM produces high-precision results with a minimal computation cost.
