Denoising of aeromagnetic data via the wavelet transform

Noise has traditionally been suppressed or eliminated in aeromagnetic data sets by the use of Fourier analysis filters and, to a lesser degree, nonlinear statistical filters. Although these methods are quite useful under specific conditions, they produce undesirable effects when denoising features of moderate to large amplitude and spatial extent. In this study, a new wavelet analysis procedure is presented that substantially reduces the contribution from high-frequency random noise and noise that is user defined. Applications to both synthetic data and aeromagnetic data from southern Alberta, Canada, show that the wavelet method eliminates the noise portion of the signal more efficiently and retains a greater amount of geologic data than other methods.