Potential field continuation in spatial domain: A new kernel function and its numerical scheme

As a significant data processing method, the potential field continuation is usually implemented in frequency domain, but rarely in spatial domain. However, the space-domain method has the advantages of being more accurate and flexible. In this study, we propose a new numerical integral approach to solve the integration equation. The algorithm can be applied to upward continuation as well as stable downward continuation, and can be used to obtain continued potential field data from a plane upward to a surface and from a surface downward to a plane. A smooth fitting curve is proposed to determine optimal iterative number for the iteration procedure of the algorithm. Both synthetic and field data are used to test the proposed approach and compare with previous studies. The numerical experiment results indicate the proposed method has a stable numerical performance and a wide range of application.