Improving reservoir volumetric estimations in petroleum resource assessment using discovery process models

The reservoir volumetric approach represents a widely accepted, but flawed method of petroleum play resource calculation. In this paper, we propose a combination of techniques that can improve the applicability and quality of the resource estimation. These techniques include： 1） the use of the Multivariate Discovery Process model （MDP） to derive unbiased distribution parameters of reservoir volumetric variables and to reveal correlations among the variables; 2） the use of the Geo-anchored method to estimate simultaneously the number of oil and gas pools in the same play; and 3） the crossvalidation of assessment results from different methods. These techniques are illustrated by using an example of crude oil and natural gas resource assessment of the Sverdrup Basin, Canadian Archipelago. The example shows that when direct volumetric measurements of the untested prospects are not available, the MDP model can help derive unbiased estimates of the distribution parameters by using information from the discovered oil and gas accumulations. It also shows that an estimation of the number of oil and gas accumulations and associated size ranges from a discovery process model can provide an alternative and efficient approach when inadequate geological data hinder the estimation. Cross-examination of assessment results derived using different methods allows one to focus on and analyze the causes for the major differences, thus providing a more reliable assessment outcome.

Comparisons of Maximum Likelihood Estimates and Bayesian Estimates for the Discretized Discovery Process Model

A Bayesian approach using Markov chain Monte Carlo algorithms has been developed to analyze Smith’s discretized version of the discovery process model. It avoids the problems involved in the maximum likelihood method by effectively making use of the information from the prior distribution and that from the discovery sequence according to posterior probabilities. All statistical inferences about the parameters of the model and total resources can be quantified by drawing samples directly from the joint posterior distribution. In addition, statistical errors of the samples can be easily assessed and the convergence properties can be monitored during the sampling. Because the information contained in a discovery sequence is not enough to estimate all parameters, especially the number of fields, geologically justified prior information is crucial to the estimation. The Bayesian approach allows the analyst to specify his subjective estimates of the required parameters and his degree of uncertainty about the estimates in a clearly identified fashion throughout the analysis. As an example, this approach is applied to the same data of the North Sea on which Smith demonstrated his maximum likelihood method. For this case, the Bayesian approach has really improved the overly pessimistic results and downward bias of the maximum likelihood procedure.

Process Discovery and Refinement of an Enterprise Management System

The need for the analysis of modern businesses is rapidly increasing as the supporting enterprise systems generate more and more data.This data can be extremely valuable for executing organizations because the data allows constant monitoring,analyzing,and improving the underlying processes,which leads to the reduction of cost and the improvement of the quality.Process mining is a useful technique for analyzing enterprise systems by using an event log that contains behaviours.This research focuses on the process discovery and refinement using real-life event log data collected from a large multinational organization that deals with coatings and paints.By investigating and analyzing their order handling pro-cesses,this study aims at learning a model that gives insight inspection of the processes and performance analysis.Furthermore,the animation is also performed for the better inspection,diagnostics,and compliance-related questions to specify the system.The configuration of the system and the conformance checking for further enhancement is also addressed in this research.To achieve the objectives,this research uses process mining techniques,i.e.process discovery in the form of formal Petri nets models with the help of process maps,and process refinement through conformance checking and enhancement.Initially,the identified executed process is reconstructed by using the process discovery techniques.Following the reconstruction,we perform a deep analysis for the underlying process to ensure the process improvement and redesigning.Finally,some recommendations are made to improve the enterprise management system processes.

Discovery process, clinical characteristics, and treatment of patients infected with avian influenza virus （H7N9） in Shanghai

During the spring of 2013,a novel avian-origin influenza A （H7N9） virus emerged and spread in Shanghai.On May 9,2013,33 lab-confirmed cases （2 children and 31 adults） have been reported,among whom 13 died.Among the 31 adult cases of H7N9 avian influenza A virus infections in humans,80.6% （25/31） were older men （average age 65 years）.Clear history of poultry exposure was found in eight patients （8/33,24.3%） and the remaining 21 cases had been suspected poultry exposure.Clustered cases were found in two families （two cases from a father and his son,and the other two cases from a wife and her husband）.However,no evidence of human-to-human transmission had been identified.Avian influenza is one of the most dangerous contagions in poultry worldwide,and avian influenza A virus is the major pathogen responsible.Transmission from poultry to humans has now been proven.Some gene segments of the strain have mutated,and further mutations might result in human-to-human transmission.

Formal Modeling and Discovery of Multi-instance Business Processes: A Cloud Resource Management Case Study

Process discovery, as one of the most challenging process analysis techniques, aims to uncover business process models from event logs. Many process discovery approaches were invented in the past twenty years;however, most of them have difficulties in handling multi-instance sub-processes. To address this challenge, we first introduce a multi-instance business process model(MBPM) to support the modeling of processes with multiple sub-process instantiations. Formal semantics of MBPMs are precisely defined by using multi-instance Petri nets(MPNs)that are an extension of Petri nets with distinguishable tokens.Then, a novel process discovery technique is developed to support the discovery of MBPMs from event logs with sub-process multi-instantiation information. In addition, we propose to measure the quality of the discovered MBPMs against the input event logs by transforming an MBPM to a classical Petri net such that existing quality metrics, e.g., fitness and precision, can be used.The proposed discovery approach is properly implemented as plugins in the Pro M toolkit. Based on a cloud resource management case study, we compare our approach with the state-of-theart process discovery techniques. The results demonstrate that our approach outperforms existing approaches to discover process models with multi-instance sub-processes.