A FRENCH scientist believes techniques he has developed for medical imaging could be applied successfully to undersea exploration.
Professor Mathias Fink, in Perth for the Australian Society of Geophysicists Conference, started research into time reversal mirrors in 1985.
His time reversal technique allows extraneous noise in ultrasounds to be cancelled out, resulting in clearer images.
The technique can also be used to focus ultrasonic pulses more tightly for the treatment of gall stones and the like.
It is believed the technique could be applied to the seismic techniques currently used to hunt for minerals and oil offshore.
Professor Fink has begun working in collaboration with Curtin University to apply his technology to the exploration industry.
Chevron’s Mike Sayers also believes the technique could help explorers to divine clearer images of the sub-
surface.
Chevron is heavily involved with the North West Shelf project and has recently taken over operatorship of WAPET exploration operations.
Furthermore, if the velocity of sound from different rock types could be determined, it would not only tell explorers what the surface looked like but what rock types were there as well.
