Microseismics & seismic tomography
Overview
Microseismic monitoring techniques have been used by the coal and hard-rock mining industry for more than 20 years. New requirements have been received from the industry for more accurate and reliable microseismicity in near real-time. Interpretation of microseismicity in terms of geomechanics has also been in high demand. With changes of mining conditions, geological environment and government regulations, microseismic monitoring techniques must be improved in response to these changes.
Our research is focussed on addressing these issues. Our research interests and capabilities include:
- Roof condition assessment in underground mining
- Longwall geomechanics
- Mapping of periodic fracturing patterns for roof weighting predictions
- 4D mapping of fracture growth for gas emission and water ingress assessment
- Design and installation of microseismic systems for mining and tunneling
- Processing and analysis of microseismic data
- Weak event analysis
- Geothermal activity assessment
- Automatic microseismic data discrimination, classification and characterisation
- A rapid 3D ray tracing method to provide more accurate event locations.
- Design of specialised geophones for aggressive environments
- Seismic tomography using shearer as source
Seismic tomography using the shearer as a source to infer change of stress condition and existence of unexpected geological structures in the roof
Weak seismicity (red bars) and triggered strong events (coloured circles) for an open pit mine
Publications
Publications by Xun Luo listed here.