Global quieting of high-frequency seismic noise due to COVID-19 pandemic lockdown measures.

Human activity causes vibrations that propagate into the ground as high-frequency seismic waves. Measures to mitigate the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic caused widespread changes in human activity, leading to a months-long reduction in seismic noise of up to 50%. The 2020 seismic noise quiet period is the longest and most prominent global anthropogenic seismic noise reduction on record. Although the reduction is strongest at surface seismometers in populated areas, this seismic quiescence extends for many kilometers radially and hundreds of meters in depth. This quiet period provides an opportunity to detect subtle signals from subsurface seismic sources that would have been concealed in noisier times and to benchmark sources of anthropogenic noise. A strong correlation between seismic noise and independent measurements of human mobility suggests that seismology provides an absolute, real-time estimate of human activities.

Laser ultrasonic measurements to estimate the elastic properties of rock samples under in situ conditions.

We present a new noncontact methodology to excite and detect ultrasonic waves in rocks under in situ pressure and temperature conditions. Optical windows in the side of a pressure vessel allow the passage of a laser source and a receiver for noncontact laser ultrasonic measurements. A heating mantle controls the temperature, and a rotational stage inside the vessel makes it possible to obtain measurements as a function of angle. This methodology is the first to combine the advantages of laser ultrasonics (LUS) over traditional transducer methods with measurements under in situ pressure and temperature conditions. These advantages include the absence of mechanical coupling, small sampling area, and broadband recordings of absolute displacement. After describing the experimental setup, we present control experiments to validate the accuracy of this new system for acquiring rock physics data. Densely sampled rotational scans performed on an Alpine Fault ultramylonite rock reveal a decrease in P-wave anisotropy from 62% at atmospheric pressure to 36% at 16 MPa. This result highlights the importance of performing rock physics measurements under in situ confining stress and demonstrates the advantages of the methodology for investigating anisotropy. In addition, a 5.6% decrease in the P-wave velocity of the ultramylonite sample between 20 °C and 100 °C at a constant 10 MPa confining stress demonstrates the capability of this new methodology for acquiring data under both in situ pressure and temperature conditions. This new methodology opens the door for probing the pressure and temperature dependence of the elastic properties of rocks and other materials using LUS techniques.

Estimating the Green's function using a single channel dual-beam interferometer.

Cross-correlation of independent, equipartitioned wavefields is a well-established method to estimate the elastic Green's function, commonly termed seismic interferometry. In this article, the sum of a wavefield recorded at two locations in a single channel is used to estimate the Green's function via the autocorrelation; the result contains some predicted artefacts. The underlying theory and hardware required to estimate the Green's function is presented and compared to traditional seismic interferometry. This technique is used to estimate the elastic Green's function between two locations on an aluminum block with surface scatterers. Wavefields excited via rapid thermoelastic expansion of the surface using a pulsed laser are detected by a dual-beam heterodyne interferometer. The detector is capable of directly recording the sum of a wavefield measured at two locations in a single channel. This method could be an effective, low cost, and non-contacting technique for structural monitoring, particularly where ambient noise has established equipartitioned wavefields in the structure.

All-optical extravascular laser-ultrasound and photoacoustic imaging of calcified atherosclerotic plaque in excised carotid artery.

Photoacoustic (PA) imaging may be advantageous as a safe, non-invasive imaging modality to image the carotid artery. However, calcification that accompanies atherosclerotic plaque is difficult to detect with PA due to the non-distinct optical absorption spectrum of hydroxyapatite. We propose reflection-mode all-optical laser-ultrasound (LUS) imaging to obtain high-resolution, non-contact, non-ionizing images of the carotid artery wall and calcification. All-optical LUS allows for flexible acquisition geometry and user-dependent data acquisition for high repeatability. We apply all-optical techniques to image an excised human carotid artery. Internal layers of the artery wall, enlargement of the vessel, and calcification are observed with higher resolution and reduced artifacts with nonconfocal LUS compared to confocal LUS. Validation with histology and X-ray computed tomography (CT) demonstrates the potential for LUS as a method for non-invasive imaging in the carotid artery.

A Marchenko equation for acoustic inverse source problems.

From acoustics to medical imaging and seismology, one strives to make inferences about the structure of complex media from acoustic wave observations. This study proposes a solution that is derived from the multidimensional Marchenko equation, to learn about the acoustic source distribution inside a volume, given a set of observations outside the volume. Traditionally, this problem has been solved by backpropagation of the recorded signals. However, to achieve accurate results through backpropagation, a detailed model of the medium should be known and observations should be collected along a boundary that completely encloses the volume of excitation. In practice, these requirements are often not fulfilled and artifacts can emerge, especially in the presence of strong contrasts in the medium. On the contrary, the proposed methodology can be applied with a single observation boundary only, without the need of a detailed model. In order to achieve this, additional multi-offset ultrasound reflection data must be acquired at the observation boundary. The methodology is illustrated with one-dimensional synthetics of a photoacoustic imaging experiment. A distribution of simultaneously acting sources is recovered in the presence of sharp density perturbations both below and above the embedded sources, which result in significant scattering that complicates the use of conventional methods.

Nonconfocal all-optical laser-ultrasound and photoacoustic imaging system for angle-dependent deep tissue imaging.

Biomedical imaging systems incorporating both photoacoustic (PA) and ultrasound capabilities are of interest for obtaining optical and acoustic properties deep in tissue. While most dual-modality systems utilize piezoelectric transducers, all-optical systems can obtain broadband high-resolution data with hands-free operation. Previously described reflection-mode all-optical laser-ultrasound (LUS) systems use a confocal source and detector; however, angle-dependent raypaths are lost in this configuration. As a result, the overall imaging aperture is reduced, which becomes increasingly problematic with depth. We present a reflection-mode nonconfocal LUS and PA imaging system that uses signals recorded on all-optical hardware to create angle-dependent images. We use reverse-time migration and time reversal to reconstruct the LUS and PA images. We demonstrate this methodology with both a numerical model and tissue phantom experiment to image a steep-curvature vessel with a limited aperture 2-cm beneath the surface. Nonconfocal imaging demonstrates improved focusing by 30% and 15% compared to images acquired with a single LUS source in the numerical and experimental LUS images, respectively. The appearance of artifacts is also reduced. Complementary PA images are straightforward to acquire with the nonconfocal system by tuning the source wavelength and can be further developed for quantitative multiview PA imaging.

PLACE: an open-source python package for laboratory automation, control, and experimentation.

In modern laboratories, software can drive the full experimental process from data acquisition to storage, processing, and analysis. The automation of laboratory data acquisition is an important consideration for every laboratory. When implementing a laboratory automation scheme, important parameters include its reliability, time to implement, adaptability, and compatibility with software used at other stages of experimentation. In this article, we present an open-source, flexible, and extensible Python package for Laboratory Automation, Control, and Experimentation (PLACE). The package uses modular organization and clear design principles; therefore, it can be easily customized or expanded to meet the needs of diverse laboratories. We discuss the organization of PLACE, data-handling considerations, and then present an example using PLACE for laser-ultrasound experiments. Finally, we demonstrate the seamless transition to post-processing and analysis with Python through the development of an analysis module for data produced by PLACE automation.

Characterizing phantom arteries with multi-channel laser ultrasonics and photo-acoustics.

Multi-channel photo-acoustic and laser ultrasonic waves are used to sense the characteristics of proxies for healthy and diseased vessels. The acquisition system is non-contacting and non-invasive with a pulsed laser source and a laser vibrometer detector. As the wave signatures of our targets are typically low in amplitude, we exploit multi-channel acquisition and processing techniques. These are commonly used in seismology to improve the signal-to-noise ratio of data. We identify vessel proxies with a diameter on the order of 1 mm, at a depth of 18 mm. Variations in scattered and photo-acoustic signatures are related to differences in vessel wall properties and content. The methods described have the potential to improve imaging and better inform interventions for atherosclerotic vessels, such as the carotid artery.

Analyzing the coda from correlating scattered surface waves.

The accuracy of scattered Rayleigh waves estimated using an interferometric method is investigated. Summing the cross correlations of the wave fields measured all around the scatterers yields the Green's function between two excitation points. This accounts for the direct wave and the scattered field (coda). The correlations themselves provide insights into the location of the scatterers, as well as which scatterer is responsible for particular parts of the coda. Furthermore, these measurements confirm a constant-time arrival in the correlations, not part of the Green's function, but which has previously been derived as a result of the generalized optical theorem.

Laser excitation of a fracture source for elastic waves.

We show that elastic waves can be excited at a fracture inside a transparent sample by focusing laser light directly onto this fracture. The associated displacement field, measured by a laser interferometer, has pronounced waves that are diffracted at the fracture tips. We confirm that these are tip diffractions from direct excitation of the fracture by comparing them with tip diffractions from scattered elastic waves excited on the exterior of the sample. Being able to investigate fractures-in this case in an optically transparent material-via direct excitation opens the door to more detailed studies of fracture properties in general.

Multicomponent wavefield characterization with a novel scanning laser interferometer.

The in-plane component of the wavefield provides valuable information about media properties from seismology to nondestructive testing. A new compact scanning laser ultrasonic interferometer collects light scattered away from the angle of incidence to provide the absolute ultrasonic displacement for both the out-of-plane and an in-plane components. This new system is tested by measuring the radial and vertical polarization of a Rayleigh wave in an aluminum half-space. The estimated amplitude ratio of the horizontal and vertical displacement agrees well with the theoretical value. The phase difference exhibits a small bias between the two components due to a slightly different frequency response between the two processing channels of the prototype electronic circuitry.

Cancellation of spurious arrivals in Green's function extraction and the generalized optical theorem.

The extraction of the Green's function by cross correlation of waves recorded at two receivers nowadays finds much application. We show that for an arbitrary small scatterer, the cross terms of scattered waves give an unphysical wave with an arrival time that is independent of the source position. This constitutes an apparent inconsistency because theory predicts that such spurious arrivals do not arise, after integration over a complete source aperture. This puzzling inconsistency can be resolved for an arbitrary scatterer by integrating the contribution of all sources in the stationary phase approximation to show that the stationary phase contributions to the source integral cancel the spurious arrival by virtue of the generalized optical theorem. This work constitutes an alternative derivation of this theorem. When the source aperture is incomplete, the spurious arrival is not canceled and could be misinterpreted to be part of the Green's function. We give an example of how spurious arrivals provide information about the medium complementary to that given by the direct and scattered waves; the spurious waves can thus potentially be used to better constrain the medium.

Modified Kubelka-Munk equations for localized waves inside a layered medium.

We present a pair of coupled partial differential equations to describe the evolution of the average total intensity and intensity flux of a wave field inside a randomly layered medium. These equations represent a modification of the Kubelka-Munk equations, or radiative transfer. Our modification accounts for wave interference (e.g., localization), which is neglected in radiative transfer. We numerically solve the modified Kubelka-Munk equations and compare the results to radiative transfer as well as to simulations of the wave equation with randomly located thin layers.

1D energy transport in a strongly scattering laboratory model.

Radiative transfer (RT) theory is often invoked to describe energy propagation in strongly scattering media. Fitting RT to measured wave field intensities is rather different at late times, when the transport is diffusive, than at intermediate times (around one extinction mean free time), when ballistic and diffusive behavior coexist. While there are many examples of late-time RT fits, we describe ultrasonic multiple scattering measurements with RT over the entire range of times--from ballistic to diffusive. In addition to allowing us to retrieve the scattering and absorption mean free paths independently, our results also support theoretical predictions in 1D that suggest an intermediate regime of diffusive (nonlocalized) behavior.