UH EAS Chairman Publishes Textbook on Seismic Data Processing
Book Covers Industry and Academic Applications

Hua-Wei Zhou, professor and chairman of the University of Houston’s Department of Earth and Atmospheric Sciences, published a graduate text for seismic data processing covering both the areas of applied industry exploration (well logs, seismic reflection images) and the more academic area of solid Earth geophysics (earthquakes, Earth structure, tomography). Zhou also holds the Robert Sheriff Endowed Chair of Applied Seismology in the department.

The text, “Practical Seismic Data Analysis,” reflects on Zhou's unique, 25-year career that has included academic solid Earth studies on the seismic tomography of subduction zones at CalTech and his early years as a professor at UH starting in 1989, work with Exxon Production Research in Houston, and later teaching experiences at Texas Tech University and again at UH – teaching in both the department and the professional master's program.

Designed from many years of classroom interactions and including well-honed exercises for students, the book is intended to accompany a one semester course covering all the key processing techniques needed for students preparing for careers in the academic world and in the rapidly growing oil and mineral exploration industry. These methods include digital seismic data processing, seismic migration, and subsurface model building.

This book joins a long tradition of widely used texts from other UH geophysics professors including Margaret Bishop's 1960 text on subsurface mapping, Robert Sheriff's 1990 text on applied geophysics, Chris Liner's 2004 text on 3D seismology, and recently Arthur Weglein's 2012 text (with Robert Stolt) on seismic imaging and inversion (see article on and review of Weglein/Stolt text).