Specifications
University of Pretoria etd – Combrinck, M (2006)
One of the most common assumptions is that the host rock containing the ore body of
interest is very resistive. This implies a significant decrease in computational effort, but
unfortunately is one of the assumptions not always met in true field conditions. The
non- compliance of this assumption is of great importance in the closely related field of
landmine detection where small pieces of metal are looked for, often in very conductive
and magnetite rich top soils (Butler, 2003).
1.2 Objective
The objective of this work is to find an efficient, preferably automated, algorithm or
interpretational procedure that can be applied in real time to scenarios of conductors
buried in a resistive and/or conductive host rock or half space. This will not provide the
ultimate answer, but can be considered another useful tool available to the geophysicist to
reduce some assumptions. Real-time conductor location and imaging (i.e. estimating size,
depth and conductance) can attribute significantly to reduction of processing and
interpretaion cost in the mineral industry and might also encourage the development of
new instruments. For example, a multi-channel metal detector with real-time processing
and conductivity imaging of data might prove to be very valuable in the field of landmine
detection , especially in conductive top soil regions where traditional metal detectors
sometimes prove to be inadequate (Butler, 2003).
3