David Alumbaugh

David Alumbaugh

PhD	Geophysical Engineering
PhD university	University of California, Berkeley

David L. Alumbaugh received a B.S. (1986) in geological sciences from San Diego State University, an M.S. (1989) and Ph.D. (1993) in geophysical engineering from the University of California, Berkeley. From 1993 to 1999 he was employed at Sandia National Laboratories as a staff scientist, from 1999 to 2003 he was a professor at the University of Wisconsin in the Geological Engineering Program, and in 2003–2004 he served as a visiting professor in the Geophysics Department at Stanford University. Since 2004 has been at Schlumberger’s EMI Technology center in Richmond, California, where he is a geophysical advisor/project manager leading a research group studying the physics of, and developing interpretation methods for, electromagnetic geophysical methods as applied toward oil exploration, reservoir characterization, and water front mapping. He is also an adjunct professor in the Department of Earth and Planetary Sciences at the University of California Berkeley. He was the recipient of the Gerald R. Hohmann award for Excellence in Applied Electrical Geophysics in 1998 and the 1992 Best Student Paper Award from SEG. He has served as a special editor and associate editor for GEOPHYSICS. He is a member of SEG, AGU, and SPWLA.

SEG Reginald Fessenden Award 2024

David Alumbaugh is recognized with the Reginald Fessenden Award for his contributions to the field of electromagnetics. He has proven his leadership in electromagnetic technology development and application in fossil energy reservoir delineation, geothermal exploration, and carbon storage. He has also done pioneering work in marine controlled source electromagnetic imaging of the earth’s subsurface as well as multiphysics data integration and machine learning. He has worked at a number of positions in small companies, large private companies, national labs, and as a university professor. His work is well documented as the author or coauthor of more than 60 peer-reviewed publications, seven book chapters, and 14 U.S. patents.

Biography Citation for the Reginald Fessenden Award

by Michael Wilt

I like to say there are two types of applied geophysicists in the world — those working with seismic technology and “other.” Dave Alumbaugh falls into the second category (as do I). It is a less secure career, and it follows a wide-ranging, diverse, and interesting path. It is, however, a slightly bumpy ride.

I first met Dave when he was an incoming graduate student at the University of California, Berkeley in the engineering geosciences group. I could see that he fit right in with the intelligent, diverse and slightly oddball group of students and faculty. In fact, he was mentored and taught electromagnetics (EM) by Berkeley graduate George Jiracek when he was at San Diego State University. He was basically a typical California kid. He played lead guitar in Berkeley rock band A Different Kitchen and was an avid surfer.

His PhD project was to develop a way to image the high-quality data sets coming from the emerging crosswell EM technology. He collected his own field data and successfully imaged an injected saltwater plume at our local test site in Richmond, California. His thesis, and associated technical papers, stood out as fundamental work in crosswell EM technology and formed the basis for many improvements in the coming years.

In the years that followed, he was not afraid to take on challenges and professional risks. At each stop along the way, he made important technical contributions in a variety of applications including 3D parallel computing and 3D EM modeling and inversion, crosswell and single-well EM tool physics, marine EM, and integrated data interpretation, which have ultimately led to a rich legacy of technical contributions and publications.

His postdoctoral and subsequent staff position at Sandia National Laboratories in New Mexico was a rich professional stop with Greg Newman in the world of numerical modeling and massively parallel code development. I think it was also an enjoyable place for family in a natural setting, but he always wanted to teach at the university level. He then applied and was granted an assistant professor post at the University of Wisconsin. The job was appealing, and he was good at it, even achieving tenure at an early stage, but the lure of a possible return to California and to escape the harsh Midwestern climate led him to return to the Bay Area after five years. Here, he took a major risk, securing only a temporary part-time faculty position at Stanford University along with a little consulting work to support a growing family with two small boys. At this time, I was at Electromagnetic Instruments Inc. in Richmond, California, and after we were acquired by Schlumberger, we quickly decided that we needed Dave to further our modeling and inversion capability for crosswell EM technology.

Dave spent seven years at Schlumberger’s EMI Technology Center working with a first-rate engineering team on the development of their amazing crosswell EM system and in the emerging field of marine EM technology. He ultimately became center manager in 2009. Then, in 2011, he was offered a job joining Mike Hoversten to form an EM group at Chevron in San Ramon, California.

The reader may see a pattern emerging. It seems when everything was professionally stable and he was set up for a long run, Dave would change tack and move to a different location and less secure position. He might argue that this led to a lot of creativity and new developments, but this was accompanied by professional and personal insecurity, which I guess he didn’t mind.

The Chevron job abruptly ended when the company insisted on a move to Houston. Dave could not see a way to do this without separating himself from his two young sons, so he left the job and ultimately signed on with a start-up in the Bay Area (NEOS GeoSolutions) where he spent several years doing data integration using a variety of surface and airborne EM and seismic data sets to solve various problems.

With a major lull in the industry in 2018, NEOS was teetering and ultimately succumbed. Again, Dave was at the mercy of the prevailing wind. At one point, he became a pedicab driver for San Francisco tourists, which he described as a great way to stay in shape and not a bad income — but not the intellectual challenge he needed. Soon after this, he joined BlueGreen Geophysics, a small consulting company specializing in EM geophysics, and began bringing in geophysics-related income again. At this time, I had moved to a postretirement staff position trying to run the EM group at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory and was looking for help. We recruited Dave to take this position full time and expand the role of EM at the lab, which he did in 2019 and he is there today. Again, he has made significant contributions — this time in CO2 storage monitoring and machine learning.

So, here’s to celebrating a long and very fruitful career. I hope that it has been as fun for him living the dream as it was for me watching him do it.