INFORMATION ON ELASTIC PARAMETERS OBTAINED FROM THE AMPLITUDES OF REFLECTED WAVES

Seismic amplitude variation with offset data contain information on th e elastic parameters of geological layers. As the general solution of the inverse problem consists of a probability over the space of all po ssible earth models, we look at the probabilities obtained using ampli tude variation with offset (AVO) data for different choices of elastic parameters. A proper analysis of the information in the data requires a nontrivial definition of the probability defining the state of tota l ignorance on different elastic parameters (seismic velocities, Lame' s parameters, etc.). We conclude that mass density, seismic impedance, and Poisson's ratio constitute the best resolved parameter set when i nverting seismic amplitude variation with offset data.