Erosion-dilation analysis for experimental and synthetic microstructures of sedimentary rock

Microstructures such as rock samples or simulated structures can be describ ed and characterized by means of ideas of spatial statistics and mathematic al morphology. A powerful approach is to transform a given 3D structure by operations of mathematical morphology such as dilation and erosion. This le ads to Families of structures, for which various characteristics can be det ermined, for example, porosity, specific connectivity number or correlation and conncclivity functions. An application of this idea leads to a clear d iscrimination between a sample of Fontainebleau sandstone and two simulated samples. (C) 2000 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved.