Accurate and efficient seismic modeling in random media

Abstract

The optimum method for seismic modeling in random media must (1) be highly accurate to be sensitive to subtle effects of wave propagation, (2) allow coarse sampling to model media that are large compared to the scale lengths and wave propagation distances which are long compared to the wavelengths. This is necessary to obtain statistically meaningful overall attributes of wavefields. High order staggered grid finite‐difference algorithms and the pseudospectral method combine high accuracy in time and space with coarse sampling. Investigations for random media reveal that both methods lead to nearly identical wavefields. The small differences can be attributed mainly to differences in the numerical dispersion. This result is important because it shows that errors of the numerical differentiation which are caused by poor polynomial interpolation near discontinuities do not accumulate but cancel in a random medium where discontinuities are numerous. The differentiator can be longer than the medium scale length. High order staggered grid finite‐difference schemes are more efficient than pseudospectral methods in two‐dimensional (2-D) elastic random media.