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The article announces several awards including Robert M. Mitchum received an award for best papers in Basin Research and Nigel Anstey received an award for Best Paper in First Break on the behalf of European Association of Geoscientists and Engineers (EAGE).

Provides information on the requirements of the research papers that will be published in the periodical "First Break." Elements of a good paper; Common problems in reviewing the papers; Suggestion of the author on how to write a concise and complete research paper.

A call for papers for the European Association of Geoscientists and Engineer's (EAGE's) Caspian Workshop to be held at the Renaissance hotel in Atyrau, Kazakhstan from September 19-21, 2011 is presented.

Information about several papers discussed at the international workshop sponsored by Italian European Association of Geoscientists & Engineers - Society of Exploration Geophysicists (EAGE-SEG) on the gravity, magnetic, and electromagnetic (EM) methods held in Capri, Italy in April 15-18, 2007 is presented. Topics include the imaging and interpretation of the EM, and the tensorial gravity measurement. The workshop has been attended by the 29 different countries.

The article reports that the periodical "Geophysical Prospecting" will produce a special issue on Simultaneous Source Methods for Seismic Data in 2012, which aims on collecting data in the seismic industry and to respond to the growing research in the industry.

The article offers information on the European Association of Geoscientists & Engineers (EAGE) and the Society of Exploration Geophysicists (SEG) Research Workshop 2009 to be held on September 14-17, 2009 in Boltaña, Spain.

The article offers information on the Near Surface 2008 - the 14th European Meeting of the Environmental and Engineering Geophysics Society, which will be held in Kraków, Poland on September 15-17, 2008.

Reports on the introduction of Manuscript Central's Scholar-One digital manuscript submission and review system. Acceptance for publication in the periodical "Geophysical Prospecting"; Number of pages required for each manuscript; Importance of innovative geophysical content.

We present new results of the recently introduced approach to surface-multiple attenuation through sparse inversion. This method aims to attenuate surface multiples of all periodicities without the need for an adaptive subtraction or a near offset extrapolation. The aim of our paper is twofold. First, we subject the sparse inversion method to data beyond previously published proof-of-principle models and present results on highly complex 2D synthetics and real data, demonstrating that sparse inversion may, in principle, serve as a powerful tool to attenuate short and long period multiples in complex settings. We illustrate the competitive nature of the sparse inversion predictions by benchmarking the method's results to standard processing flows. In addition, we demonstrate the correspondence of the estimated primaries to the underlying impedance models. Next, we show results of a 2D sparse inversion approach to real 3D deep-marine data and demonstrate, through a further synthetic study, that the presence of cross-line dip leads to a time shift of the predicted multiples, resulting in reduced multiple attenuation. Our results confirm that future developments of this technique will require a full 3D approach in order for the sparse inversion method to be widely effective in practice. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Multi-point geostatistics is an algorithm which complements the traditional variogram driven cell-based and object model- ling approaches to facies modelling. It is situated somewhere between the two, being a cell-based approach, but because it uses estimates of the multi-variate distribution instead of the simple bi-variate distributions that are available to variogram- driven algorithms, it is capable of capturing geometries that are more similar to those available with object modelling. This paper introduces and reviews the merits and weaknesses of this new method, particularly with regard to its ability to provide additional control in conditioning to secondary data such as may be provided from seismic data. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Comments on Ingebret Gausland paper "The Stacking Response: What Happened to Offset?," published in January 2004 issue of the "First Break." Connection between stacking and migration; Condition on when the stationary phase approximation can be meaningful; Relationship between time-delay and phase shift.

Focuses on a position paper "Seismic Surveys and Marine Mammals," published by the International Association of Oil and Gas Producers and the International Association of Geophysical Contractors. Impact of sound on the marine environment; Ambient sound level at a specific location; Management of seismic surveys; Sound propagation; Two types of sound in the marine environment. INSET: Another investigation begins …..

Fractured reservoir characterization requires a good understanding of the spatial distribution of fracture intensity. In practice, the relationships between various geological, structural and seismic attributes and fracture intensity are complex and can be highly nonlinear. The complexity increases exponentially when there are many potential fracture-related attributes available, such as attributes derived from azimuthal AVO. This paper presents an improved integrated workflow for ranking the attributes, understanding data limitations, mapping fracture intensity with neural networks, and quantifying uncertainty. The study uses a set of soft attributes and cumulative gas production data, a proxy for fracture intensity, at the Pinedale Anticline at Wyoming to demonstrate the workflow and to show its usefulness in practice. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Reports on the proceedings of the the 66th European Association of Geoscientists and Engineers Conference and Exhibition held in Paris, France. Compilation and presentation of papers which reflected differing interests and disciplines in the association; Corporations and organizations who participated in the exhibit; Speakers and lectures.

Presents an edited version of the author's paper on the nature of scientific discovery. Concepts of insight, discovery and creativity for scientists; Factors involved in efforts to better understand nature; Conscious and unconscious aspects of scientific discovery.

Summary For onshore seismic data the resolution at the exploration target level depends on the complex interaction of many factors. These include the survey environment, geology, acquisition configuration and data processing procedures. When designing seismic surveys we wish to achieve the required target level resolution while minimising both cost and risk. For Vibroseis surveys, the time expended recording each source point, called the sweep effort/VP, can be a key cost factor. Uncertainty about the impact of differing options for the acquisition geometry and source point sweep effort on the target level resolution represents a risk factor. A 3D seismic exploration methodology driven by the resolution at the target level has been implemented for onshore Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates, by the Abu Dhabi Company for Onshore Operations (ADCO), in co-operation with Western Geophysical. Techniques originally developed for the on-crew processing of 2D acquisition parameter tests have been extended to 3D. Integrated data acquisition and processing tests provide fully processed, 3D migrated data volumes. Test analysis is based on the interpreted resolution at the target level, allowing direct judgements on key parameters affecting data cost and quality. The spatial distribution of source energy, improving the trace offset distribution and increasing the CMP fold is seen as significantly more important than the sweep effort/VP. Close co-operation between ADCO and Western's Geophysical Abu Dhabi data acquisition and processing staff ensure that complex data manipulation issues are handled in a timely manner, allowing the results of the testing to influence an ongoing 3D project. Use of this methodology has so far provided both improvements in data quality to levels not seen before for Abu Dhabi onshore data while simultaneously reducing the cost and risk of data acquisition. This paper summarises results from some of the key events in the development of the acquisition... [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Since the end of the 'boom' days of the late 1970s, petroleum companies have wrestled with productivity and competitive position. But following the global oil price collapse of 1998, the stakes have never been higher. A whole new productivity race for survival has begun in which being 'informationalized' may be the key. Well-known thinker on oil inducstry issues, Robert Peebler, president and CEO of Landmark Graphics Corporation, explains in this edited version of a recent position paper. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article reports on some of the challenges facing the oil industry regarding recruiting and retaining talent within the global workforce. Technical skills are diminishing for several reasons including high competition for technical people and rapid technological shift from paper-based to electronic work practices. The key to meet the challenges posed by global employee shortage is to develop new resourcing strategies, capitalizing on the emerging talents around the globe.

Reports the appeal on geo-energy research by ENeRG, a network of European Research & Development organizations in the European Union countries. Content of the position paper; Arguments of ENeRG on the resolution of energy-related issues; Forecasts on the increase of energy dependence of Europe.

The following abstracts of papers presented at the ARVASS (Atéliers de Récherche sur les Bassins Sédimentaire) Conference held in France, May 1997, have been selected as being of particular interest to readers of First Break and to give them an indication of the work being carried out in European research institutes. They are published as received and have not been subjected to editorial revision. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article focuses on magnetic resonance sounding (MRS) as the highlight in the 4th Workshop on MRS, which was held in Grenoble, France on October 20-23, 2009. It says that papers from the workshop were published in the April 2011 issue of "Near Surface Geophysics." The papers discuss the considerations and theoretical basis of MRS and experiences and issues in the use of MRS in different geographical regions and hydrogeological setups.

The article offers information on the EarthDoc, a geoscience database of European Association of Geoscientists and Engineers (EAGE). It states that the database features papers and articles related to geoscience industry. It mentions that the database also features papers presented at the events of EAGE which covers wide topics including geophysics, petroleum geoscience and geophysical prospecting.

The article reports on the special issue of the journal "Near Surface Geophysics" (NSG) for December 2010 which highlights 18 student-based researches. It mentions that guest editors Nigel Cassidy and Jamie Pringle received 60 abstracts after they called for papers from the student community. It states that the papers include field examples such as a seismic case study on Kilmichael dome, multi-technique mapping of weathering zones, and riverbed hydrostratigraphy characterization.

Information about several papers discussed at the Society of Exploration Geophysicists (SEG)/ European Association of Geoscientists and Engineers (EAGE) workshop in Cairo, Egypt from May 17-19, 2010 is presented. It mentions that the workshop focuses on the development of land seismic acquisition. It states that the papers presented discussed topics on hydraulic vibrators performance, approaches for harmonics removal from the vibrator records, and sampling for the near surface characterization.

The article focuses on two papers on techniques to account for transverse isotropy in seismic migration and velocity analysis. In one paper, the authors derive slowness surface approximations for quasi-shear wave propagation in transversely isotropic media. In another paper, the authors present a technique for migration velocity analysis and prestack depth migration in tilted transversely isotropic media.

The article reports on the organization of a workshop entitled, A View from Space - Near Surface Characterization from Remote Sensing, for the European Association of Geoscientists & Engineers (EAGE) 2008 Annual Meeting in Rome. The workshop is intended to be an inter-disciplinary exchange of technology and experience between geologists, geophysicists in both near surface and hydrocarbon applications and remote sensing scientists. The author welcomes the contributed papers and posters to be sent to the convenors via the Business Office in the same format as normal EAGE papers until March 15, 2008. The convenors of the event include Andreas Laake, Fabio Rocca and Aldo Vesnaver.

This article presents a preview of the first research paper of the January issue of the journal "Geophysical Prospecting." The first paper presents a case study in which the foundation of map of an 11th century Byzantine church using 3D seismic travel time tomography was conducted. The conditions of the site suggested that the velocity is anisotropic with a vertical symmetry axis. The authors estimated that the anisotropy from a travel time analysis applies an approximate correction for it in their imaging. The consideration of anisotropy improves the travel-time fit and the image of the foundations. Scientist undertook a seismic modeling and petro-elastic analysis study of the feasibility of time-lapse monitoring of pressure depletion in the low-porosity tight gas-bearing Rotliegendes sandstones of the southern North Sea. Production induced changes in the unfractured sandstones were unlikely to be seismically traceable. With committed seismic processing and acquisition, the stress sensitivity of the fractured upper part of the reservoir allowed the production to be detected from time shifts at the base of the Rotliegendes reservoir.

The article presents an overview of the November 2005 issue of the journal "Geophysical Prospecting." This issue opens with a paper on using a density-depth relationship from a deep borehole to constrain the 2D inversion of a gravity profile. From testing the 2D assumption by constructing 3D models varying in lateral extent from 10 to 200 km, the authors conclude that the uncertainty from 3D effects was comparable with the misfit achieved by the inversion. Another short paper aims to combine the computational efficiency of wave-path migration and the imaging quality of least-squares migration. The researchers apply their technique, which they call least-squares wave path migration, to a 2D line from the North Sea and conclude that the improved image quality of wave path migration comes at an acceptable increase in computational cost. Shallow reflection seismology commonly has to deal with strong coherent noise trains and near surface heterogeneity. In a city, these problems are compounded by cultural noise and logistical challenges.

This article presents information on various papers published in volume 53 of the periodical "Geophysical Prospecting." According to a paper, from measurements on two suites of North Sea sandstones at simulated reservoir conditions the authors investigated relationships between P and S-wave velocities and quality factors and porosity and permeability. The P-to-S velocity ratio varies with pore fluid type and differential pressure and there is an inverse correlation between P-wave quality factor and permeability. The attenuation measurements are consistent with a squirt-flow mechanism but too large for Biot-flow. Another paper presents information on a simple scaling relationship that allows electrical and electromagnetic depth sounding results to be compared or combined in a joint inversion to a resistivity-depth profile. Application of the scaling relationship to field data from typical geological and landfill environments illustrates how the compatibility of electromagnetic and direct current sounding curves can be checked prior to removal of any electrical static shift or a joint inversion. A case study illustrates the robustness of the combined inversion scheme.

Discusses several research papers published in the May 2004 issue of the periodical "Geophysical Prospecting". Description of the contribution of two- and three-dimensional GPR surveys to a multidisciplinary study of a sandstone reservoir analogue in the first paper by Zeng and colleagues; Demonstration of the advantages of applying Euler deconvolution to the analytic signal instead of total field magnetic data; Simulation of elastic wave propagation through three-dimensional media.

Information about several papers discussed at the Geophysics-2009 conference regarding the difficult times faced by the geoscientific industry is presented. Topics include the increased number of geological exploration companies that have closed, the lack of specialists in the industry, and the big gap between the older generation of geoscientists and young graduates. The conference features the performance of A. M. Gorodnickij with his songs and poems.

An interview with Vladimir Grechka, a geophysicist, is presented. When asked about his experience and skills in geophysics, he shares of gaining vast knowledge in the exploration and development of geophysics activities. Grechka believes that geophysics satisfies his hobby and interest in physics. He shares that his lecture will be able to provide knowledge on how to write research papers.

Highlights the International Petroleum Technology Conference organized by the European Association of Geoscientists & Engineers with other major oil and gas industry societies on November 21-23. 2005 in Doha, Qatar. Number of technical papers planned for the conference; List of attendees; Value of the conference.

Focuses on the European Association of Geoscientists and Engineers' (EAGE) efforts on the implementation and configuration of the online submission and review system Scholar-One. Convenience of the submission process through Internet application; Specifications of the system's automatic electronic mail correspondence; Accessibility of the system to authors who want to submit their research papers to the EAGE.

Reports on the presentation of the Norman Falcon Award to geologists Livio Ruvo, Andrea Aldergheri, Roberto Galimberti, Elena Nembrini, Lucia Rossi and Roberto Ruspi during the 2004 European Association of Geoscientists and Engineers Awards in Paris, France in June 2004. Publication of the award recipients' research paper "Multi-disciplinary study of the heavy-oil reservoirs in the Armatella Field, Sicily" in the vol. 9, no.3 issue of the journal "Petroleum Geoscience"; Integration of reservoir study; Assessment of reservoir geometry.

Highlights the short course entitled 'Understanding Seismic Anisotropy in Exploration and Production,' held in Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates in October 2002. Number of participating geoscientists; Papers presented.

Information on the 2nd International Geosciences Student Conference (IGSC) held at the Faculty of Geology, Geophysics, and Environmental Protection in Krakow, Poland on July 9-12, 2011 is presented. It says that the 158 students from 16 countries have presented 58 papers related to geosciences. It adds that a short course concerning the modern three-dimensional (3D) seismic interpretation for hydrocarbon exploration was presented by Geofizyka Kraków.

Information about several papers discussed at the Third EAGE Passive Seismic Workshop held on March 27-30, 2011 in Acropolis in Athens, Greece is presented. Topics include microseismic monitoring, hydrocarbon exploration, geothermal and hazards, mining and geotechnical applications, and modeling. The workshop featured some geologists and engineers including Tomas Fischer, and Steve Spottiswoode.

The article reports that the European Association of Geoscientists & Engineers (EAGE) Technical Programme Committee has selected the papers and poster presentations for the association's annual conference to be held in Vienna, Austria in May 2011. It says that the number of submissions increased more than 10% to almost 1000 abstracts. It mentions that conference participants can expect 71 oral and 39 poster presentations.

Information about several papers discussed at a conference sponsored by European Association of Geoscientists and Engineers (EAGE), EurAsian Geophysical Society (EAGO) and the Society of Exploration Geophysicists (SEG) on geosciences is presented. Topics include oil and gas operations, its challenges in different regions of Russia and the geological settings brought by modern technology. The conference was attended by 750 people from 31 countries which also represents 273 companies.

Information about several papers discussed at a workshop about trace interpolation techniques which played important roles in attaining the trace sampling necessary for best results is presented. Topics include the use of acquisition methods, the concept of stacking and the use of faster imaging algorithms. The workshop featured several contributors including Harry Rynja of Shell, Michele Buia of ENI and Arnaud Huck of dGB.

The article discusses the contents of the journal "Basin Research." It states that the journal intends to print original and high impact research papers on sedimentary basin systems which will be circulated in behalf of the International Association of Sedimentologists and the European Association of Geoscientists and Engineers. It states that one of the topics highlighted in the June 2010 issue of the journal is the research of Mesozoic and Cenozoic sediments in the northern North Sea.

Information about several papers discussed at the meeting of European Association of Geoscientists and Engineers (EAGE) related to the technical program of EAGE is presented. Topics include selection of 905 submitted abstracts, and sessions based on geomechanics, and flow in carbonate rocks. The symposium featured several technical program officers including Pierre Lanfranchi, H. P. Hansen, and E. Muyzert.

Information about several papers discussed at International Petroleum Technology Conference (IPTC) on the figures of the world's oil and gas sector is presented. Topics include on how energy leaders can lessen the negative effects of the global economic and political volatility and how the financial crisis can become an opportunity to increase efficiency in the production of fossil fuels. The conference featured the Minister of Foreign Affairs in Qatar Sheikh Hamad Bin Jassim Bin Jabr Al-Thani.

The article offers information on the changes on the journal "Geophysical Prospecting," including the addition of the sections Review Papers, Letters to the Editor, and Research Notes.

The article offers information on the European Association of Geoscientists & Engineers (EAGE) Awards 2010. It notes that the award is given to authors of the best papers published in EAGE journals and best oral and poster presentations at the 71st EAGE Conference & Exhibition in Amsterdam, Netherlands. It further states that the award is designed to reward scientific excellence at all levels and throughout the age groups.

Information about several papers discussed at a conference sponsored by the European Association of Geoscientists & Engineers (EAGE) Student Programme on geophysics held in Amsterdam, Netherlands in 2009 is presented. Topics include the student poster presentation on energy, the presentation of the ENeRG award winner, and the student's participation on the Geo-Quiz. The conference featured several students including Chris Leader.

Information about several papers discussed at a workshop sponsored by the European Association of Geoscientists & Engineers (EAGE) on the use of the locally coherent events (LCE) in seismic imaging held in Amsterdam, Netherlands in 2009 is presented. Topics include the definition and estimation of the LCE, the pre-processing and processing of LCE, and the use of the velocity model estimation. The workshop featured several geophysicist including Juergen Mann.

Information about several papers discussed at a workshop on the integration of geophysics and reservoir engineering sponsored by the European Association of Geoscientists & Engineers (EAGE) held in Amsterdam, Netherlands in 2009 is presented. Topics include the impact of offshore fields in production, the contribution of time-lapse seismic in reservoir production, and the use of satellite interferometry in measuring subsidence. The symposium featured several geophysics including Karel Maron.