computation

Article
Preprocessing of Gravity Data
Jana Izvoltova 1, * , Dasa Bacova 1 , Jakub Chromcak 1 and Stanislav Hodas 2

1 Department of Geodesy, University of Zilina, Univerzitna 8215/1, 010 26 Zilina, Slovakia;

[email protected] (D.B.); [email protected] (J.C.)
2 Department of Railway Engineering and Track Management, University of Zilina, Univerzitna 8215/1,
010 26 Zilina, Slovakia; [email protected]
* Correspondence: [email protected]; Tel.: +421-41-5135550

Abstract: The paper deals with computation techniques applied in preprocessing of gravity data,
which are based on time series analysis by using mathematical and statistical smoothing techniques
such as moving average, moving median, cumulative and moving average, etc. The main aim of
gravity data preprocessing is to avoid abrupt errors caused by a sudden movement of the subsoil
due to human or natural activities or systematic instrumental influences and so provide relevant
gravity values, which are then subjected to further processing. The new approach of the described
research involves the preprocessing phase in gravity data analysis to identify and avoid gross errors,
which could influence the size of unknown parameters estimated by the least square method in the
processing phase.

Keywords: gravity data; time series analysis; moving average; moving median

1. Introduction
Gravimetry is a science discipline used to provide important information about the
earth’s geodynamical processes. Therefore, it is an integral part of almost all geosciences,
including geophysics, geodesy, geology, geotechnics, etc. Gravity observations are useful
Citation: Izvoltova, J.; Bacova, D.;
for providing information on mass distribution within the earth or space, but they depend
Chromcak, J.; Hodas, S. Preprocessing
on time variation. Gravimetric measurements bring temporal gravity variations involving
of Gravity Data. Computation 2022, 10,
natural and human influences. These gravity variations can be recorded by the absolute
82. https://doi.org/10.3390/
or relative gravimeters, depending on particular technology and purpose. While absolute
computation10060082
gravity measurements determine the gravity from the fundamental acceleration quantities
Academic Editor: Demos T. Tsahalis and time, the modern, relative ones use a counterforce for the determination of gravity
Received: 1 April 2022
differences between different stations or, if carried out in the stationary mode, the variations
Accepted: 18 May 2022
of gravity with time [1]. The second mentioned observation method brings so-called
Published: 27 May 2022
stationary gravity values, organized in a time series dataset. The final gravity at the station
depends on an instrument’s precision and the used processing method, which involves
Publisher’s Note: MDPI stays neutral
external and internal influences known as gravity corrections [2], instrumental drift, earth
with regard to jurisdictional claims in
tides, and random noise. The precision of the reached gravity depends on identifying
published maps and institutional affil-
measurement errors and their subsequent reduction or elimination if possible. The raw
iations.
gravity dataset, arranged in a time series, could be sometimes influenced by the sudden
changes in readings brought by different causes: sudden earth movements, reading error,
internal instrument effects, external influences, etc. These sudden changes in measured
Copyright: © 2022 by the authors.
signals are called abrupt errors and are expressed as “jumping signals” in graphs.
Licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland. The paper’s primary goal is to focus attention on the process of identification of abrupt
This article is an open access article errors of gravity data by using the mathematic-statistical technique used to be preferred
distributed under the terms and mainly in financial engineering. The above-mentioned preprocessing analysis of time series
conditions of the Creative Commons data proceeds to the phase of creating a smoothed model, which is then submitted to
Attribution (CC BY) license (https:// further processing. The processing phase includes the minor gravity corrections involving
creativecommons.org/licenses/by/ external and internal influences on gravity data. It is not the main topic of the paper. Hence,
4.0/). it is mentioned only marginally at the end of the paper.

Computation 2022, 10, 82. https://doi.org/10.3390/computation10060082 https://www.mdpi.com/journal/computation

 Computation 2022, 10, 82 2 of 7

2. Time Series Analysis of Gravity Data

The preprocessing phase of gravity data consists of time series analysis to identify
abrupt errors in the gravity dataset. Mathematics offers many tools to smooth such errors
occurred in a continuous signal, from which methods of moving averages seem to be very
useful. It belongs to the mathematic-statistical techniques that are useful for analyzing
time series data, mainly in the trading world. In quantitative trading, time series analysis
is about fitting statistical models, inferring underlying relationships between series or
predicted future values, and generating trading signals. The method of time series analysis
is a relatively old method, well described by many scientists like Anderson (1977), Kendall
and Stuart (1979), Box, Brockwell (1991), Mongomery (1991), Jenkins and Reinsel (1994),
Chatfield (1996), etc. [2–8]. It is applied by many users from various scientific disciplines,
which operate with some quantity that is measured sequentially in time over some inter-
val. In geodesy, time series analysis is often used to process long-term global navigation
satellite system observations to determine earth and ocean tidal effects in a permanent
station network.
Some smoothing techniques have been applied to filter time series data to find the
reliable function for cleaning up the raw gravity dataset (Figure 1). A moving average is an
effective tool for adjusting a short-term time-series variation [9]. Several moving averages
in time series analysis differ with the placement of the adjusted value. A simple “moving
average” (MA) or one-sided moving average is placed at the end of values being averaged:
1 k
k + 1 j∑
MAi = xi − j (1)
=0
where index i changes from k + 1 to n, n is the number of data and k is the order or size of the
sampling window. Two-sided MA is centered in the middle of the values being averaged:
k
1
MAi = ∑ x
2k + 1 j=−k i+ j
(2)

where index i changes from k + 1 to n − k. While a two-sided moving average can estimate
or see the trend, the one-sided moving average can be used as a simple forecasting method.
Both types of moving averages use an odd number of periods. However, when working
with time series, seasonality effects must be smoothed, which requires the period to be equal
to seasonal length. “Centred moving average” (CMA) is often applied for this purpose,
which distinguishes from others by using an even number of values:

Computation 2022, 10, x FOR PEER REVIEW MAi−0.5 + MAi+0.5 3 of 7

CMAi = (3)
2

Figure
Figure1.1.Time
Timeseries
seriesof
of gravity
gravity dataset (originalfigure).
dataset (original figure).

If the user wants to get the average of all data up until the current datum point, “cu-
mulative moving average” (CuMA) is suitable. In CuMA, the data arrive in an ordered
datum stream, and the user would like to get the average of all of the data up until the
Computation 2022, 10, 82 3 of 7

If the user wants to get the average of all data up until the current datum point,
“cumulative moving average” (CuMA) is suitable. In CuMA, the data arrive in an ordered
datum stream, and the user would like to get the average of all of the data up until the
current datum point
x + . . . + xt
CuMAt = 1 (4)
t
where t changes from 1 to n. In the case of robust statistics, “Moving median” (MM)
is the most suitable to smooth or remove the time series noise. The moving median is
not so popular as the moving average, but it provides a more robust estimate of a trend
compared to the moving average. It is not affected by outliers, and it removes them. The
moving median in a sampling window is calculated from linear approximation defined in
the interval:
i/(n + 1) ≤ α ≤ (i + 1)/(n + 1) (5)
and is defined as robust statistics corresponding to 50% quantile (α = 0.5):
 
i
u α = ( n + 1) α − ( u i +1 − u i ) + u i (6)
n+1
An overview of the values of the particular moving averages at critical points of gravity
dataset is in Table 1, in which the column SMOOTHED GRAV. represents the adjusted data
estimated by the least-squares method

Table 1. A demonstration of the sensitivity of the particular smoothing techniques.

RAW SMOOTHED
DAY MA CMA CuMA MM
GRAV. GRAV.
0.7192 5894.2870 5894.2900 5894.2920 5894.2530 5894.2900 5894.2870
0.7200 5894.2720 5894.2830 5894.2530 5894.2870 5894.2910
0.7207 5894.2930 5894.2840 5894.2860 5894.2530 5894.2870 5894.2930
0.7215 5894.2950 5894.2870 5894.2530 5894.2930 5894.2950
0.7222 5894.2940 5894.2940 5894.2880 5894.2530 5894.2940 5894.2940
0.9374 5894.3100 5894.3100 5894.3110 5894.2660 5894.3100 5894.3100
0.9381 5894.3280 5894.3160 5894.2660 5894.3110 5894.3140
0.9389 5894.3100 5894.3160 5894.3150 5894.2660 5894.3100 5894.3100
0.9396 5894.3110 5894.3160 5894.2660 5894.3110 5894.3110
0.9404 5894.3110 5894.3110 5894.3150 5894.2660 5894.3110 5894.3110
0.9885 5894.3020 5894.2980 5894.2970 5894.2680 5894.2960 5894.3020
0.9893 5894.3110 5894.3030 5894.2680 5894.3020 5894.3010
0.9900 5894.2920 5894.3020 5894.3010 5894.2680 5894.3020 5894.3010
0.9908 5894.2950 5894.2990 5894.2680 5894.2950 5894.3010
0.9916 5894.2950 5894.2940 5894.2990 5894.2680 5894.2950 5894.3000
Mean square error in
0.0009 0.0011 0.0468 0.001 0.0027
mGal

“Weighted moving average” (WMA) is often applied in technical analysis of financial

data with the specific meaning of weights that decrease arithmetical progression. In a p-day
of WMA, the latest day has weight p, the second latest p − 1, etc., down to one:

p.x1 + ( p − 1) x2 + . . . + xi
W MA = (7)
p ( p + 1)
2
where index i means the time and p is the weight. The weighted moving average has not
been applied in the smoothing analysis of gravity data because of the unreasoning use of
weights in gravity time series.
“Exponential moving average” (EMA) is also weighted toward the most recent value,
but the rate of decrease between one value and its preceding value is not consistent. The
difference in the decrease is exponential. The formula for EMA [10] is as follows:
Computation 2022, 10, 82 4 of 7

 
EMA = p xi + (1 − p) xi−1 + (1 − p)2 xi−2 + . . . + (1 − p)k xi−k + (1 − p)k+1 EMAi−(k+1) + . . . (8)

where k changes from 0 to n. The weight of the general datum point is p(1 − p)i . WMA and
EMA techniques seem to be more suitable for comparing more grav observed in various
time intervals.
Besides the mentioned smoothing techniques, there are many other signal processing
methods. Among them, wavelet denoising plays an essential role in separating clean
images from noisy images or filtering airborne gravity data [11,12].

3. Abrupt Error Identifying

Scientists use many methods to identify outliers or gross errors in observation. Most
of them utilize statistical hypothesis testing based on comparing the testing value with the
critical one, which is represented by the quantile of a probability distribution. Abrupt error
is assumed to be an outlier of the gravity dataset, which is indicated by comparing the
corresponding residual value with the critical value estimated from the equation:
Tα = tσGRAV (9)
where σGRAV is the standard deviation of gravimeter SCINTREX Autograv CG-5 [13]
defined by producer by the value 0.5 mGal and t is a confidential coefficient defined as
a quantile of Student distribution dependent on specified probability. Quantitatively is t
equal to 2.
Experimental measurements were obtained from three days of static observation of
gravity acceleration realized by autograph with the setup read time of 60 s, which responded
to 4331 observation cycles. From the Autograv optional parameters, tide and terrain
corrections have been disallowed to perform the requisite functions in the processing phase.
Statistical hypothesis testing has been applied to confirm the existence of the abrupt
error. It compares the testing value represented by the corresponding residual ei (Table 2)
with the critical value Tα = 0.010 mGal by defining the probability value p = 0.95. As
illustrated in Figure 1, three abrupt errors have been identified in the gravity dataset with
the appropriate values of residuals and moving averages.

Table 2. An overview of the particular residuals estimated at critical points in the time series.

RAW
DAY eMA eCMA eCuMA eMM eSMOOTH
GRAV.
0.7192 5894.2870 −0.0039 −0.0049 0.0338 −0.003 −0.0039
0.7200 5894.2720 −0.0189 0.0188 −0.015 −0.0189
0.7207 5894.2930 0.0020 0.0075 0.0397 0.0060 0.0020
0.7215 5894.2950 0.0039 0.0417 0.0020 0.0039
0.7222 5894.2940 0.0029 0.0064 0.0407 0.0000 0.0029
0.9374 5894.3100 −0.0043 −0.0005 0.0443 0.0000 −0.0043
0.9381 5894.3280 0.0138 0.0623 0.0170 0.0138
0.9389 5894.3100 −0.004 −0.0048 0.0442 0.0000 −0.004
0.9396 5894.3110 −0.0029 0.0452 0.0000 −0.0029
0.9404 5894.3110 −0.0028 −0.0039 0.0452 0.0000 −0.0028
0.9885 5894.3020 0.0006 0.0048 0.0343 0.0060 0.0006
0.9893 5894.3110 0.0099 0.0433 0.0090 0.0099
0.9900 5894.2920 −0.0088 −0.0087 0.0242 −0.01 −0.0088
0.9908 5894.2950 −0.0056 0.0272 0.0000 −0.0056
0.9916 5894.2950 −0.0053 −0.0041 0.0272 0.0000 −0.0053

4. Regression Function as the Smoothing and Estimating Function

The smoothed method depends on the amount and character of time series data or the
operator’s possibilities and preferences. However, the simplest way to avoid the abrupt
error seems to be to apply the reliable smoothing and estimating technique to adjust raw
 Computation 2022, 10, 82 5 of 7

gravity data and estimate the unknown parameters. Time series gravity data assumes to
use nonlinear regression function used to estimate unknown parameters. The advantage of
combining both moving average and regression function in gravity dataset (Figure 1) leads
to computation of the reliable earth tide parameters from the mathematical model:

∆gi = ∆g0 + g1 (ti − t0 ) + g2 (ti − t0 )2 + g3 (ti − t0 )3 +

(10)
+ a sin ti T−t0 + b cos ti T−t0 + c sin ti T−2t0 + d cos ti T−2t0 + ∆
1 1

where ∆g0 , g1 , g2 , g3 are estimated unknown parameters of a gravimeter drift a, b, c, d are

unknown parameters of earth tides depending on time changes ti − t0 , which are needed to
compute amplitude Ai and phase pi of a particular tidal wave with its period Ti according
to the following formulas [14]: q
Ai = a2i + bi2 (11)

bi
pi = arctg (12)
ai
Computation 2022, 10, x FOR PEER REVIEW The appropriate coefficients of gravimeter drift, the earth tides parameters estimated 6 of 7
by the periods T1 = 1.075806 and T2 = 0.517525 defined for tidal wave components O1 and
M2, and calculated values of amplitude and phase are displayed in Table 3.
Table 3. Tidal parameters estimated in gravity model (8).
Table 3. Tidal parameters estimated in gravity model (8).
g ∆g
g1
g1
g2
g2
g3
g3
a
a b
b
c
c
d
d
A
A
p
p
5894.269 −0.000193 −0.000004 0.000000 −0.004785 −0.028121 −0.013337 0.021867 0.028525 1.402253
5894.269 −0.000193 −0.000004 0.000000 −0.004785 −0.028121 −0.013337 0.021867 0.028525 1.402253

The last symbol of Equation (10) represents a random gravitational noise that can be
The last symbol of Equation (10) represents a random gravitational noise that can be
linear or harmonic, in nature and represents the unused rest of the harmonic series. The
linear or harmonic, in nature and represents the unused rest of the harmonic series. The
unknown
unknown regression
regressionparameters
parameters asasthe
thedrift
driftand
and tidal
tidal parameters
parameters of gravity
of gravity data data and their
and their
relevant variance components were estimated by the least square
relevant variance components were estimated by the least square method. method.
The
Thegravity
gravitypreprocessing finisheswith
preprocessing finishes withthethe creation
creation of the
of the smoothed
smoothed gravity
gravity model,
model,
displayed
displayed in in Figure
Figure 2, 2, which
which was
was preparedfor
prepared forthe
thedata
dataprocessing
processingtotoapply
applynominal
nominal grav-
itygravity corrections.
corrections.

Figure 2. 2.
Figure Smoothed
Smoothedgravity
gravity model (originalfigure).
model (original figure).

5. Discussion
5. Discussion
TheThe paper‘smain
paper's maintopic
topic is
is to
to apply
applythe
thereliable
reliablesmoothing technique
smoothing for the
technique fortime seriesseries
the time
analysis of the gravity dataset. While the moving average, moving median, and
analysis of the gravity dataset. While the moving average, moving median, and centred centred
moving average seems to be very useful in the process of gross error identification, the
moving average seems to be very useful in the process of gross error identification, the
cumulative moving average appears to be not so sensitive to smooth abrupt errors in the
gravity data. Weighted and exponential smoothing techniques appear to be not suitable
to use in gravity data preprocessing. Mathematics provides another smoothing technique
based on data adjustment and estimation. The most suitable for gravity data seems to be
Computation 2022, 10, 82 6 of 7

cumulative moving average appears to be not so sensitive to smooth abrupt errors in the
gravity data. Weighted and exponential smoothing techniques appear to be not suitable
to use in gravity data preprocessing. Mathematics provides another smoothing technique
based on data adjustment and estimation. The most suitable for gravity data seems to be
the nonlinear regression with the least square restriction.

6. Conclusions
The smoothed gravity model was then subjected to the implementation of the nominal
gravity corrections to find out the mathematical model of gravity acceleration at the station.
The processing phase consists of involving external and internal influences represented
by earth and ocean tides, hydrogeological forces, atmospheric pressure and temperature
changes, seismic and terrain corrections, tilt and calibration corrections, and instrumental
drift, which occurs due to the stress relaxation in the elastic quartz system of modern
relative gravimeters. The most mathematical model involves random noise, representing
random disturbances of gravity data.
Besides the mentioned effects, other disturbances influence the actual gravity accelera-
tion value at the station as polar motion, instrument and station origin, earthquakes, tecton-
ics, etc. Most of these influences are system parameters and are involved as firmware filters.
The widely used processing method of gravity data is a remove-restore technique [15,16].
This general method of gravity data processing is based on two phases. The first one, called
the remove phase, is based on making nominal corrections for the largest influences, such as
tides and pressure. Then, the problems are fixed in the residual signal and returned to the
removed signals in the second restore phase.
Another approach to gravity data preprocessing seems to be finding the causes of
abrupt error occurrences, which can have various origins consisting of external, instrumen-
tal, or human sources.

Author Contributions: Practical outputs, solution, analysis, D.B. and J.C.; Conceptualization, S.H.;
Methodology, writing J.I.; All authors have read and agreed to the published version of the manuscript.
Funding: This research was funded by Ministry of education, science, research and sporz of the
Slovak Republic, grant number: VEGA 1/0643/21.
Institutional Review Board Statement: Not applicable.
Data Availability Statement: There is only a part of data from own direct measurements in the
manuscript. No conflict with their using.
Acknowledgments: This article is the result of the implementation of the project VEGA 1/0643/21,
“Analysis of spatial deformations of a railway track observed by terrestrial laser scanning”, supported
by the Scientific Grant Agency of the Ministry of Education, Science, Research and Sport of the
Slovak Republic and Slovak Academy of Sciences. This article is the result of implementing the
project KEGA 038ŽU-4/2020,“New approaches to teaching physical geodesy in higher education”,
supported by the Scientific Grant Agency of the Ministry of Education, Science, Research and Sport
of the Slovak Republic.
Conflicts of Interest: The authors declare no conflict of interest.

References
1. Torge, W. Gravimetry; Walter de Gruyter: Berlin, Germany; New York, NY, USA, 1989; 465p, ISBN 3110107023.
2. Lederer, M. Accuracy of the relative gravity measurements. Acta Geodyn. Geomater. 2009, 6, 383–390.
3. Anderson, O.D. Time series analysis and forecasting: Another look at the Box-Jenkins approach. J. R. Stat. Soc. 1977, 26, 285–303.
Available online: https://www.jstor.org/stable/2987813 (accessed on 1 January 2020). [CrossRef]
4. Kendall, M.; Stuart, A. The Advanced Theory of Statistics—Volume 2: Inference and Relationship; Charles Griffin & Co. Limited:
London, UK, 1979; 736p.
5. Box, G.E.P.; Jenkins, G.M.; Reinsel, G.C. Time Series Analysis, 4th ed.; John Wiley & Sons, Inc.: Hoboken, NJ, USA, 2008; 746p,
ISBN 9781118619193.
6. Brockwell, P.J.; Davis, R.A. Time-Series: Theory and Methods; eBook; Springer: Berlin, Germany, 1991; 577p, ISBN 978-1-4419-0320-4.
7. Montgomery, D.C. Design and Analysis of Experiments, 8th ed.; John Wiley & Sons: New York, NY, USA, 2013; 724p.
Computation 2022, 10, 82 7 of 7

8. Chatfield, C. The Analysis of Time Series—An Introduction, 5th ed.; Chapman and Hall CRC: London, UK, 2003; 352p.
9. e-Handbook of Statistical Methods, NIST/SEMATECH. 2012. Available online: http://www.itl.nist.gov/div898/handbook/
(accessed on 24 April 2012).
10. Hunter, J.S. The Exponentially weighted moving average. J. Qual. Technol. 2018, 18, 203–210. [CrossRef]
11. El-Habiby, M.; Sideris, M.G. On the Potential of Wavelets for Filtering and Thresholding Airborne Gravity Data; The University of
Calgary, 2500 University Drive, N.W.: Calgary, AB, Canada. Available online: https://www.isgeoid.polimi.it/Newton/Newton_
3/El-Habiby.pdf (accessed on 21 January 2006).
12. Zhao, L.; Wu, M.; Forsberg, R.; Olesen, A.V.; Zhang, K.; Caou, J. Airborne Gravity Data Denoising Based on Empirical Mode
Decomposition: A Case Study for SGA-WZ Greenland Test Data. ISPRS Int. J. Geo-Inf. 2015, 4, 2205–2218. [CrossRef]
13. Scintrex. CG-5 Operational Manual; Scintrex System—Part #867700 Revision 8; Scintrex: Concord, ON, Canada, 2012.
14. Vanicek, P. The Earth Tides; Lecture Notes No. 36; University of New Brunswick: Fredericton, NB, Canada, 1973; p. 38.
15. Torge, W.; Jürgen, M. Geodesy; De Gruyter: Berlin, Germany, 2012; 433p, ISBN 978-3-11-020718-7.
16. Wellenhof, B.H.; Moritz, H. Physical Geodesy; Springer: Vienna, Austria; New York, NY, USA, 2006; 403p, ISBN 10 3-211-33544-7.