AccScience Publishing / JSE / Online First / DOI: 10.36922/JSE026160069
ARTICLE

Optimizing three-dimensional traveltime table storage for microseismic monitoring through error-bounded compression

Yuanjian Zhou1,2 Hao Zhang1* Lei Li3,4 Dongsheng Sun1 Chongyuan Zhang1 Jing Zheng5,6 Xiangchun Wang2
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1 Institute of Geomechanics, Chinese Academy of Geological Sciences, Beijing, China
2 School of Geophysics and Information Technology, China University of Geosciences (Beijing), Haidian, Beijing, China
3 State Key Laboratory of Critical Mineral Research and Exploration, Central South University, Changsha, Hunan, China
4 School of Geosciences and Info-physics, Central South University, Changsha, Hunan, China
5 State Key Laboratory of Coal Resources and Safe Mining, China University of Mining and Technology (Beijing), Haidian, Beijing, China
6 Department of Geophysics and Information, College of Geoscience and Surveying Engineering, China University of Mining and Technology (Beijing), Haidian, Beijing, China
Received: 18 April 2026 | Revised: 4 June 2026 | Accepted: 18 June 2026 | Published online: 15 July 2026
© 2026 by the Author(s). This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License ( https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ )
Abstract

Accurate and real-time microseismic event localization is essential for monitoring subsurface engineering activities, but migration-based workflows rely on densely sampled three-dimensional traveltime tables whose storage and disk-I/O demands increase rapidly with model size and receiver coverage. For migration-based microseismic localization using three-dimensional traveltime tables, we introduce error-bounded (absolute [ABS]/relative [REL]) lossy compression via SZ2 and assess engineering viability with a full tolerance sweep and a continuous-location evaluation. On a synthetic dataset (170 × 170 × 170 grid, 8 channels), ABS bounds of 0.4–1 ms yield compression ratios of ≈13.8–16.2× with location error dloc ≈ 0.2–0.8 m and origin-time bias |∆t0| ≤ 0.05 ms. In a 30-event joint test at ABS = 1 ms, the median dloc is 2.03 m (P95 = 7.76 m) and P95 (|∆t0|) < 1 ms. A field-scale case (16 × 16 × 3.72 km; raw 479.92 MB) shows that equivalent absolute errors Aeq ≈ 0.1–2.6 ms achieve ≈ 6.3–15.8× volume reduction; under tight bounds, error slices are smooth and structure-conforming (e.g., P99 < 0.26 ms), and ABS = 1 ms reaches 13.61×. Comparing schemes at the same Aeq, REL often attains higher ratios but amplifies localization bias earlier in near-source, small-traveltime regions; ABS provides geometry-agnostic, uniform error control with greater localization robustness. We therefore recommend ABS ≈ 0.4–1 ms for real-time localization, whereas REL with Aeq ≈ 0.3–2.6 ms is suitable for archiving and fast loading. Realistic examples demonstrate the effectiveness of the optimized traveltime table storage strategy.

Keywords
Microseismic monitoring
Three-dimensional traveltime tables
Data compression
SZ2
Funding
This study was supported by the National Science and Technology Major Project (No. 2024ZD1000701, No. 2024ZD1000704), the National Natural Science Foundation of China (No. 42174122), and the Fundamental Science Foundation of the Institute of Geomechanics (No. DZLXJK202518).
Conflict of interest
The authors declare they have no competing interests.
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Journal of Seismic Exploration, Electronic ISSN: 0963-0651 Print ISSN: 0963-0651, Published by AccScience Publishing