Self-Organizing Maps in Seismic Image Segmentation

Unsupervised neural networks such as the Kohonen Self-Organizing Maps (SOM) have been widely used for searching natural clusters in multidimensional and massive data. One example where the data available for analysis can be extremely large is seismic interpretation for hydrocarbon exploration. In order to assist the interpreter in identifying characteristics of interest confined in the seismic data, the authors present a set of data attributes that can be used to train a SOM in such a way that zones of interest can be automatically identified or segmented, reducing time in the interpretation process. The authors show how to associate SOM to 2D color maps to visually identify the clustering structure of the input seismic data, and apply the proposed technique to a 2D synthetic seismic dataset of salt structures.