DETAILED ACTION
Notice of Pre-AIA or AIA Status
The present application, filed on or after March 16, 2013, is being examined under the first inventor to file provisions of the AIA .
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 103
The following is a quotation of 35 U.S.C. 103 which forms the basis for all obviousness rejections set forth in this Office action:
A patent for a claimed invention may not be obtained, notwithstanding that the claimed invention is not identically disclosed as set forth in section 102, if the differences between the claimed invention and the prior art are such that the claimed invention as a whole would have been obvious before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to a person having ordinary skill in the art to which the claimed invention pertains. Patentability shall not be negated by the manner in which the invention was made.
Claims 1, 4-9 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Pires De Vasconcelos (US 2016/0327668) in view of Iranpour et al. (US 2010/0067326).
Regarding claims 1, 6, 9, Pires De Vasconcelos discloses a method for implementing a full waveform inversion (FWI) process using angle gathers (Fig. 1; page 3, [0037]), the method comprising:
receiving observed seismic data associated with a subsurface region (page 3, [0037]) and (b)
constructing, based on the observed seismic data (page 6, [0068]), a scalar velocity model and
one or more vector velocity model partitions (fig. 1A; page 6, [0069]), wherein the one or more vector
velocity model partitions correspond to one or more unique seismic angles (fig. 1; page 6, [0068-0069]);
determining one or more vector gradients using the scalar velocity model and the (c) observed seismic data (page 6, [0068-0069]).
Pires De Vasconcelos discloses all the limitations set forth above but fails to explicitly disclose
captured by one or more seismic receivers; updating the one or more vector velocity model partitions using the one or more vector gradients.
However, Iranpour discloses captured by one or more seismic receivers (page 3, [0027]); updating the one or more vector velocity model partitions using the one or more vector gradients (page 2, [0021]).
Therefore, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art at the time the invention was first filed to incorporate the features of Iranpour within the system of Pires De Vasconcelos in order to establish a metric to indicate the accuracy of the model thereby improving the reliability of the system.
Regarding claim 4, Pires De Vasconcelos discloses wherein the one or more unique seismic angles (fig. 1A) comprises at least one of a reflection angle and an azimuth angle (fig. 1A).
Regarding claim 5, Pires De Vasconcelos wherein the one or more unique seismic angles
comprises both a reflection angle and an azimuth angle (fig. 1A).
Regarding claim 7. Pires De Vasconcelos discloses generating synthetic data from the scalar velocity model (page 3, [0036-0037]).
Regarding claim 8, Pires De Vasconcelos discloses determining residual data by comparing the synthetic data with the observed (f) seismic data (page 3, [0036-0037]).
Allowable Subject Matter
Claims 10-20 are allowed.
The following is a statement of reasons for the indication of allowable subject matter: In combination with all the limitations in the claims, the prior arts fail to teach or make obvious:
wherein the one or more vector velocity model partitions correspond to one or more unique seismic angles; generate, based on the scalar velocity model, synthetic data; determine residual data by comparing the synthetic data with the observed seismic data; determine a one or more vector gradient using the scalar velocity model and the observed seismic data; and update the one or more vector velocity model partitions using the one or more vector gradients.
Claims 2-3 are objected to as being dependent upon a rejected base claim, but would be allowable if rewritten in independent form including all of the limitations of the base claim and any intervening claims.
The following is a statement of reasons for the indication of allowable subject matter: In combination with all the limitations in the claims, the prior arts fail to teach or make obvious:
determining residual data by comparing synthetic data produced by the scalar (e) velocity model with the observed seismic data; and migrating the residual data backwards through time to determine the one or more (f) vector gradients.
Conclusion
The prior art made of record and not relied upon is considered pertinent to applicant's disclosure.
Roberts (US 2018/0059276) discloses system………images.
Mallet et al. (US 8,600,708) discloses systems………..subsurface.
Magerlein (US 9,058,302) discloses combined…matrix.
Asgedom et al. (US 2017/0234998) discloses methods
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DP
January 26, 2026
/DANIEL PREVIL/ Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2685