Direct nonlinear inversion of viscoacoustic media using the inverse scattering series

Ali Fathalian, Kristopher A. Innanen

The objective of seismic exploration is obtaining structural subsurface information from seismic data by recording seismic wave motion of the ground. The recorded data have a non-linear relationship with the property changes across a reflector. In this work, the multi-parameter multi-dimensional direct non- linear inversion is investigated based on the inverse scattering task-specific sub-series. The result is direct and non-linear and has the potential to provide more accurate and reliable earth property predictions for larger contrast and more complex. The inverse scattering method has a direct response for imaging and inversion problems for a large contrast and a multi-dimensional corrugated target. We are derived the direct non-linear inversion equation for three parameter viscoacoustic cases. Numerical tests show that non-linear inversion results provide improved estimates in comparison with the standard linear inversion. When the non-linear term add to linear term the recovered value of parameters are much closer to the exact value.