AccScience Publishing / JSE / Article / DOI: 10.36922/JSE025320052
ARTICLE

Microseismic event locations using grid-searching method and Newton–Raphson-based optimizer

Shaohui Zhou1 Tianqi Jiang2* Junhao Qu1 Peng Lin2 Yu Wang1 Yajun Li1
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1 Shandong Earthquake Agency, Jinan, Shandong, China
2 State Key Laboratory for Fine Exploration and Intelligent Development of Coal Research University of Mining and Technology-Beijing, Beijing, China
JSE 2025, 34(2), 60–71; https://doi.org/10.36922/JSE025320052
Submitted: 4 August 2025 | Revised: 22 August 2025 | Accepted: 2 September 2025 | Published: 11 September 2025
© 2025 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

Microseismic event location plays a pivotal role in industrial applications, such as coal mining and hydraulic fracturing, by revealing subsurface fracture dynamics through the spatiotemporal analysis of seismic events. As a cornerstone of microseismic monitoring, accurate event localization enables critical insights into underground structural integrity. Traditional arrival-time-based methods employ optimization algorithms to minimize residuals between observed and theoretical arrival times. While this classical approach has proven effective, its accuracy is often compromised by two key limitations: suboptimal initial iteration values and inaccuracies in velocity parameter estimation. To address these challenges, we propose an innovative localization method integrating a grid-searching strategy with a Newton–Raphson-based optimizer. Our approach begins by generating initial iterative vectors—comprising event coordinates and velocity parameters—through a systematic grid-searching technique. Subsequently, the Newton–Raphson optimizer refines these estimates within a four-dimensional search space to achieve high-precision inversion results. The efficacy of the proposed method was rigorously evaluated using both synthetic and field datasets, with comparative analyses conducted against four established localization techniques. Experimental results demonstrate that our method significantly enhances localization accuracy and robustness, reliably inverting both event locations and velocity parameters. These findings provide a valuable technical reference for advancing microseismic monitoring systems, offering improved precision in industrial applications.

Keywords
Microseismic event location
Grid-searching method
Newton–Raphson-based optimizer
Funding
This research was supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (42474189), the Open Fund Project of State Key Laboratory for Fine Exploration and Intelligent Development of Coal Research (SKLCRSM23KFA04), and the Science and Technology Innovation Team of Shandong Earthquake Agency (TD202404).
Conflict of interest
The authors declare they have no competing interests.
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Journal of Seismic Exploration, Print ISSN: 0963-0651, Published by AccScience Publishing