Geophysical Prospecting, 2012, 60, 313–336 doi: 10.1111/j.1365-2478.2011.00974.x Inversion of potential field data using the structural index as weighting function rate decay Federico Cella 1∗ and Maurizio Fedi 2 1 Department of Earth Sciences, University of Calabria, Corso Bucci, Cubo 15A, 87036 Arcavacata di Rende (Cosenza), Italy, and 2 Department of Earth Sciences, University “Federico II” of Naples, Largo San Marcellino, 10, 80138 Naples, Italy Received January 2010, revision accepted April 2011 ABSTRACT Nonparametric inverse methods provide a general framework for solving potential- field problems. The use of weighted norms leads to a general regularization problem of Tikhonov form. We present an alternative procedure to estimate the source suscep- tibility distribution from potential field measurements exploiting inversion methods by means of a flexible depth-weighting function in the Tikhonov formulation. Our approach improves the formulation proposed by Li and Oldenburg (1996, 1998), differing significantly in the definition of the depth-weighting function. In our formalism the depth weighting function is associated not to the field decay of a single block (which can be representative of just a part of the source) but to the field decay of the whole source, thus implying that the data inversion is independent on the cell shape. So, in our procedure, the depth-weighting function is not given with a fixed exponent but with the structural index N of the source as the exponent. Differently than previous methods, our choice gives a substantial objectivity to the form of the depth-weighting function and to the consequent solutions. The allowed values for the exponent of the depth-weighting function depend on the range of N for sources: 0 ≤ N ≤ 3 (magnetic case). The analysis regarding the cases of simple sources such as dipoles, dipole lines, dykes or contacts, validate our hypothesis. The study of a complex synthetic case also proves that the depth-weighting decay cannot be necessarily assumed as equal to 3. Moreover it should not be kept constant for multi-source models but should instead depend on the structural indices of the different sources. In this way we are able to successfully invert the magnetic data of the Vulture area, Southern Italy. An original aspect of the proposed inversion scheme is that it brings an explicit link between two widely used types of interpretation methods, namely those assuming homogeneous fields, such as Euler deconvolution or depth from extreme points transformation and the inversion under the Tikhonov- form including a depth-weighting function. The availability of further constraints, from drillings or known geology, will definitely improve the quality of the solution. Key words: Euler deconvolution, Inversion of potential fields, Structural Index, Weighting function rate decay. ∗ E-mail: f.cella@unical.it C  2011 European Association of Geoscientists & Engineers 313