Reconstruction of chalk pore networks from 2D backscatter electron micrographs using a simulated annealing technique

We report the stochastic reconstruction of chalk pore networks from limited morphological information that may be readily extracted from 2D backscatter electron (BSE) images of the pore space. The reconstruction technique employs a simulated annealing (SA) algorithm, which can be constrained by an arbitrary number of morphological descriptors. Backscatter electron images of a high-porosity North Sea chalk sample are analyzed and the morphological descriptors of the pore space are determined. The morphological descriptors considered are the void-phase two-point probability function and lineal path function computed with or without the application of periodic boundary conditions (PBC). 2D and 3D samples have been reconstructed with different combinations of the descriptors and the reconstructed pore networks have been analyzed quantitatively to evaluate the quality of reconstructions. The results demonstrate that simulated annealing technique may be used to reconstruct chalk pore networks with reasonable accuracy using the void-phase two-point probability function and/or void-phase lineal path function. Void-phase two-point probability function produces slightly better reconstruction than the void-phase lineal path function. Imposing void-phase lineal path function results in slight improvement over what is achieved by using the void-phase two-point probability function as the only constraint. Application of periodic boundary conditions appears to be not critically important when reasonably large samples are reconstructed.