A microseismic simulation for algorithm testing

Michael P. Lamoureux, Rituraj Shukla, Gary F. Margrave

A physical model of a microseismic array is described, used as a simple test platform to design and evaluate algorithms for locating microseismic events. Some initial testing was done, using cross correlation and phase transform methods to measure time delays, and Gauss-Newton minimization to locate the simulated acoustic event.

In summer 2011 as part of a Globalink undergraduate student research project, a DSP system interfaced to a small array of microphones was constructed and tested, to locate acoustic events in air based on measured time delays in recorded signals. A number of array geometries were designed, different delay measuring algorithms implemented, and numerical methods evaluated. The goal was to simulate the computational effort needed in a real microseismic experiment, using a simple physical device that is easily tested in a student laboratory.