# Joint Velocity Slope Diffusion Prior for Structurally Constrained Velocity Model Building

arXiv: https://arxiv.org/abs/2607.04982 · HTML: https://mlsanity.com/paper/2607.04982/

## Key facts

- No citing papers in the map yet (data through 14 Oct 2026).
- Placed in Flow matching, time series and science, one of 14 directions in Diffusion models.
- Builds on 7 of its 45 references that are in the map.
- First posted on arXiv 6 Jul 2026.

## Placed in

- Diffusion models / [Flow matching, time series and science](https://mlsanity.com/diffusion/flow-matching-time-series-and-science/)

## Builds on (most cited first, 7 of 7)

- [Denoising Diffusion Probabilistic Models](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2006.11239/) (2020)
- [Denoising Diffusion Implicit Models](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2010.02502/) (2020)
- [Diffusion Posterior Sampling for General Noisy Inverse Problems](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2209.14687/) (2022)
- [Deep-learning inversion: a next generation seismic velocity-model building method](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1902.06267/) (2019)
- [Stochastic seismic waveform inversion using generative adversarial networks as a geological prior](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1806.03720/) (2018)
- [Geophysical inverse problems with measurement-guided diffusion models](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2501.04881/) (2025)
- [PINNslope: seismic data interpolation and local slope estimation with physics informed neural networks](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2305.15990/) (2023)

## Abstract (arXiv)

High-resolution velocity models are crucial for reservoir characterization and subsurface delineation. However, the band limited nature of our surface recorded data limits resolution. Utilizing well measurements to enhance the resolution of our subsurface models is an important objective. To this end, we present a diffusion-guided framework for structurally preconditioned velocity-model reconstruction from sparse well-log information. The proposed approach combines plane-wave PDE regularization, structurally preconditioned inversion, and measurement-guided diffusion posterior sampling within a unified formulation. Local structural slopes estimated through plane-wave destruction are used both to propagate well information along geological dip directions and to guide the diffusion sampling process through a joint velocity--slope generative prior. Numerical experiments on the Volve synthetic model and the Viking Graben field dataset demonstrate that the proposed framework improves structural continuity, lateral consistency, and geological realism compared with conventional structurally preconditioned inversion approaches while maintaining computationally practical inference through DDIM sampling.