Gravity and Magnetic Basin Studies

Getting the Big Picture

Basin Studies are a useful introduction to a new area, providing valuable geologic information to help you understand the regional context of your licences or area of interest.

By implementing our interpretational skills on a regional scale, ARKeX is able to perform integrated basin analyses using potential field and available seismic data.

Structural trend analysis

Structural trend analysis can help in the design of future seismic surveys ensuring an optimal orientation. It can also define possible migration pathways and aid the understanding of the regional tectonic regimes.

Although it is regularly used in the reduction of gravity data, the structural information available in bathymetry/topography data is often over-looked. By combining automated edge-detection techniques and detailed observations, our interpreters are able to define the major structural trends in the bathymetry, gravity and magnetic data.

Basement mapping

Using our proprietary software, ARKFIELD™, ARKeX is able to perform 3D joint inversions of gravity and magnetic data. However, in order to determine the 3D structure of the underlying crystalline basement, it is first necessary to model and subsequently remove the effects of the overlying strata from the recorded gravity data.

To do this, the first step is to model a number of key interpreted seismic lines. The results of this modelling, along with any available well data, provide the constraints for the 3D inversion. Once the structure and density of the upper layers have been determined, the forward-calculated response from the layers can be subtracted from the observed gravity signal leaving only the contribution from the basement.

Sediment thickness estimation

After the basement structure has been defined, ARKeX is able to produce isopach maps of any of the modelled units.