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This is the 28th volume of Memorial Tributes compiled by the National Academy of Engineering as a personal remembrance of the lives and outstanding achievements of its members and international members. These volumes are intended to stand as an enduring record of the many contributions of engineers and engineering to the benefit of humankind. In most cases, the authors of the tributes are contemporaries or colleagues who had personal knowledge of the interests and the engineering accomplishments of the deceased. Through its members and international members, the Academy...
This is the 28th volume of Memorial Tributes compiled by the National Academy of Engineering as a personal remembrance of the lives and outstanding achievements of its members and international members. These volumes are intended to stand as an enduring record of the many contributions of engineers and engineering to the benefit of humankind. In most cases, the authors of the tributes are contemporaries or colleagues who had personal knowledge of the interests and the engineering accomplishments of the deceased. Through its members and international members, the Academy carries out the responsibilities for which it was established in 1964.
Under the charter of the National Academy of Sciences, the National Academy of Engineering was formed as a parallel organization of outstanding engineers. Members are elected on the basis of significant contributions to engineering theory and practice and to the literature of engineering or on the basis of demonstrated unusual accomplishments in the pioneering of new and developing fields of technology. The National Academies share a responsibility to advise the federal government on matters of science and technology. The expertise and credibility that the National Academy of Engineering brings to that task stem directly from the abilities, interests, and achievements of our members and international members, our colleagues and friends, whose special gifts we remember in this book.
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BY LEON THOMSEN
SVEN TREITEL, one of the giants of exploration geophysics, died April 8, 2024, shortly after his election to the National Academy of Engineering. At his retirement in 1993 from Amoco Production Company – a major American petroleum corporation at the time – Sven held the title of research consultant, the highest designation on Amoco’s technical ladder. But his influence extended far beyond his title, with a reputation that spanned the global field of exploration geophysics.
Sven was born on March 5, 1929, in Freiberg, Germany, to Josef Erich Treitel and Rosa (Bloch) Treitel. The family left Germany in the 1930s, first relocating to Spain and later settling in Argentina. He received his early education in Buenos Aires and later enrolled at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), graduating with a bachelor’s degree in 1953.
He continued at MIT for graduate studies and joined the newly formed Geophysical Analysis Group, one of the first academic-industrial consortia in geophysics, which was led operationally by Enders Robinson (1954 MIT Ph.D., NAE 1988). The group’s mission was to improve oil exploration by applying the emerging technology of digital signal processing to digital seismic data. Although the early results were promising, MIT’s Whirlwind computer lacked the power to scale the technology effectively, and the consortium disbanded in 1957.
After earning his doctorate in 1958, he joined Chevron’s exploration office in Havana. That same year, he married Renata Minerbi, introduced to him by his best friend. But after the 1959 Cuban revolution, Sven – having now lived under three dictatorships – decided that was enough. He left Chevron and joined Amoco’s Research Center in Tulsa.
As transistors replaced vacuum tubes in the 1960s, computers became more capable, and Sven was among the industry leaders applying digital processing to seismic exploration. In 1969, The Robinson-Treitel Reader was published, bringing together earlier papers by the two close friends that helped establish the modern era of digital seismic data processing. The collection, updated over the years, remains required reading for students and professionals in geophysical signal analysis. Every drop of oil found anywhere in the world since 1964, including the fuel used to power everyday transportation, has relied on this foundational technology.
At Amoco, Sven’s vision soon expanded beyond digital signal processing to include seismic imaging of the subsurface, synthetic seismic data modeling, seismic tomography, seismic data inversion for subsurface physical properties, and numerical computation.
He received numerous prestigious honors during his career, including the Reginald Fessenden Award in 1969 and the Maurice Ewing Medal – the highest honor from the Society of Exploration Geophysicists (SEG) – in 1989. He was named an honorary member of the society in 1983. The European Association of Geoscientists and Engineers awarded him the 1969 Conrad Schlumberger Award “in recognition of his pioneering work in the field of signal processing and filter theory.” His accolades also included the Marcus Milling Legendary Geoscientist Medal from the American Geosciences Institute in 2012, the IEEE Fellow 1983, and others. Over the course of three decades, he earned four Best Paper awards from the SEG.
As Sven rose through the technical ranks at Amoco, he attracted many of the brightest young minds emerging from elite graduate programs around the world – drawn both by his foundational technical contributions and his remarkable personal presence. These individuals went on to become scientific leaders in their own right, helping make Amoco’s Tulsa Research Center the industry’s premier research facility by 1990. SEG formally recognized this achievement in 2010.
Sven served as a mentor to geophysicists across the globe, within academia, among those driven by curiosity as well as by utility, and even among Amoco’s competitors. He spoke three languages fluently and several others conversationally. He was widely admired for his wisdom, intellectual honesty, political courage, broad knowledge of the arts, and self-deprecating wit. In the world of geophysics, he was known simply by his first name; there was only one Sven.
Upon his retirement from Amoco in 1993, a two-day symposium in his honor was held at the Colorado School of Mines in Golden. At the “Svenfest,” as it was affectionately called, 20 speakers from around the world presented their latest research, all of it influenced in some way by Sven. The Svenfest program contained an entry imagined for a future dictionary:
Following his formal retirement, Sven remained professionally active for decades. He continued contributing to the scientific literature, served as a visiting scholar in Karlsruhe, consulted for industry, and acted as a trusted advisor to many younger colleagues as they rose to leadership roles in various professional societies.
He is survived by his wife, Renata; two of their children, Geoffrey and Corinna; and their families.