Road to intelligent petroleum geophysical exploration:From automatic to intelligent

Artificial intelligence is becoming a research hotspot.In this study, the author introduces the background of this intelligent wave and briefly describes the history and current situation of artificial intelligence and its applications.The author then summarizes the applications of artificial intelligence in the oil and gas industries as well as geophysical exploration, and presents exploratory research works on the applications of deep learning in geophysical exploration.Next, the author proposes the architecture of the applications of intelligent technology in petroleum geophysical exploration, and discusses the development roadmap of geophysical exploration from automatic processing to intelligent interpretation, and from automatic function and workflow to intelligent systems.It is expected that the collaborative work environment of geophysical exploration will present the perspectives of parallelized back-end, visualized front-end, automatic workflow, and intelligent systems.Finally, the author proposes four suggestions for the development of big data and artificial intelligence in the oil and gas industries:①the formulation of a development plan for the application of big data and artificial intelligence technology, ②building of a platform for research and application of big data and intelligent systems; ③the establishment of a collaborative innovation center for intelligent development; and④the implementation of special action plans and demonstration projects for intelligence applications.The intelligent development of geophysical prospecting should follow the development from automatic processing to an intelligent interpretation, and focus on data-driven, incremental, and automatic processing and visualization of all information, intelligent interpretation technology, the eventual establishment of data-driven complete functions and business processes, the self-evolution intelligent systems, and a visualized and virtual reality real-time collaborative work environment.