Mrinal Sen's Research Interests
I am primarily interested in developing techniques for seismogram synthesis and imaging, and estimation of rock properties from geophysical data. During my graduate studies I worked on asymptotic methods for seismogram synthesis. You can essentially choose one of the two methods for seismogram synthesis: Exact (or more exact) methods such as the reflectivity methods, which are limited to the type of earth model you can use or Asymptotic methods (such as Ray theory and its variants) where you can use fairly realistic earth models. With graduate student Jonas De Basabe, I worked on error analysis of the spectral element and DG finite element method. Prof. Yang Liu from China University of Petroleum and I are working on new strategies for FD modeling in elastic and anisotropic media.
Seismic Migration or Imaging is an art - they are based on wave propagation models. One with a good background in theory can contribute well in this field. Much of the ideas are intuitive - they work amazingly well. The potential of the plane wave methods for imaging has not been explored well. For example it is trivial to extend plane wave theory to include the effects of anisotropy and multi-component data. Much of my current research is focussed on this aspect.
Geophysical inverse problems are an active area of research. Since joining UTIG, I worked on several geophysical parameter estimation problems. We were able to demonstrate that global optimization methods such as simulated annealing (SA) and genetic algorithm (GA) can be used effectively to several geophysical applications such as the seismic waveform inversion problem. I also showed how one could apply Gibbs' sampling and Metropolis rule to characterize uncertainties and the posterior probability density function (PPD) in model space. We are actively pursuing this area of research with application to seismic reflection data from gas hydrates, global seismology, seismic tomography, and anisotropic parameter estimation. We are developing efficient full waveform inversion algorithms for laterally varying media.
I develop parallel algorithms for seismic processing, and model earthquake seismograms for large scale earth structures. Jay Pulliam and I are studying seismograms from deep focus earthquakes to constrain anisotrpoic structures of D".
Geophysics is a lot of fun. It is an exciting field to be in - it is truly interdisciplinary. We borrow ideas and techniques developed in Physics, Math, Statistics, Computer Science, Electrical Engg and Biology - to name a few, and apply them to several geophysical problems. Of course the main objective is to solve geologic problems. I would consider it a waste of time to develop a technique that does not work on real data.
Publications in 2010
1. Smith, D., M. K. Sen, and R. Ferguson, 2010, Data regularization and datuming by conjugate gradients, Journal of Seismic Exploration, 19 (4), 321-347.
2. Porsani, M., P. L. Stoffa, M. K. Sen, and Roustam Seif, 2010, Partitioned least squares operator for large scale geophysical inversion, Geophysics, 75(6), R21-R28.
3. Liu, Yang and M. K. Sen, 2010, Acoustic VTI modeling with a time-space domain dispersion-relation-based finite-difference-based scheme, Geophysics, 75(3), A11-A17. [One of the 20 research articles with the most full-text downloads in May 2010 – rank 16]
4. Srivastava, R. P., and M. K. Sen, 2010, Stochastic pre-stack seismic inversion using fractal based priors, Geophysics, 75(3), pp. R47-R59.
5. Sil, S., R. P. Srivastava, and M. K. Sen, 2010, Observation of anisotropy in the multi-component node data from Atlantis field, Gulf of Mexico, Geophysical Prospecting, doi: 10.1111/j.1365-2478.2010.00871.x.
6. Liu, Yang and M. K. Sen, 2010, A hybrid scheme for absorbing edge reflections in numerical modeling of wave propagation, Geophysics, 75(2), P A1-A6.
7. DeBasabe, J., and M. K. Sen, 2010, Stability of the high-order finite element methods for acoustic or elastic wave propagation with high-order time stepping, Geophysical Journal International, 181, 577-590.
8. Bansal, R., and M. K. Sen, 2010, Ray-Born inversion for anisotropy parameters, Geophysical Journal International, doi: 10.1111/j.1365-246X.2009.04484.x.
Expanded Abstracts in 2010
1. Deng, Z., U. Wang, M. K. Sen, Y. He, K. Li, and X. Bai, 2010, A practical approach to mode-converted shear wave velocity analysis from 3C data, SEG annual meeting, October, Denver, USA.
2.
Ye, F., R. H. Tatham, and M. K. Sen, , 2010, Anticipated Seismic
Responses of the Bakken Formation,
3.
Ma, J., M. K. Sen, and X. Chen, 2010, OBC Multiple Attenuation Technique Using SRME
Theory, North Dakota, SEG
annual meeting, October,
4.
Saraswat, P., and M. K. Sen, 2010, Simultaneous
stochastic inversion of prestack seismic data using Hybrid
Evolutionary Algorithm, SEG annual
meeting, October,
5.
Sil, S., M. K. Sen, and B. Gurevich, 2010, On fluid substitution in porous and aligned fractured medium, SEG annual meeting, October,
6. Liu, Y., and M. K. Sen, 2010, A hybrid absorbing boundary condition for elastic wave modeling with staggered-grid finite difference, SEG annual meeting, October, Denver, USA.
7.
Liu, Y., and M. K. Sen, 2010, Finite-difference modeling with adaptive variable length spatial
operators, SEG annual meeting, October,
8. Tao, Y., M. K. Sen, N. Bangs, and T. Hess, 2010, Seismic Inversion for splay fault interpretation in the Nankai Trough accretionary wedge, Japan, SEG annual meeting, October, Denver, USA.
9.
Phan, S., and M. K. Sen, 2010, Porosity estimation
from seismic data at
10.
Srinivasan., and M. K. Sen, 2010, Mapping of diagenesis in a carbonate reservoir in the Gulf of Mexico
by a stochastic data integration technique, SEG annual meeting, October,
11.
Sen, M. K., 2010, Inverse problem of reflection seismic
data, IEEE conference on Geosciences and remote sensing (IGARSS 2010),
12. Sil, S, M. K. Sen and
T. M. Smith, 2010, Fluid substitution in an orthorhombic medium, International
workshop on seismic anisotropy,
13. Sen, M. K., P. S. Routh, and R. P. Srivastava, 2010, Use of priors and hyper-priors in stochastic inversion for reservoir parameters, SPG bi-annual meeting, Hyderabad, India.
14.
Srinivasan, S., and M. K.
Sen, 2010, Modeling diagenetic pathways constrained
to seismic impedance data in a carbonate reservoir, SPG bi-annual meeting,
15.
Liu, Y., and M. K. Sen, 2010, 3D acoustic wave modeling
with a time-space domain dispersion-relation based finite-difference Scheme,
SPG bi-annual meeting,
16.
Saraswat, P., Srivastava , R. P. and M. K. Sen, 2010, Particle Swarm and
Differential Evolution: Optimization for stochastic inversion of post-stack
seismic data, SPG bi-annual meeting,