It has been known for over 50 years that seismic anisotropy must be included in a realistic analysis of most seismic data. The evidence for this consists of the observed dependency in many contexts (reviewed briefly here) of seismic velocity upon angle of propagation and upon angle of S-wave polarization. Despite this well-established understanding, many current investigations continue to employ less realistic isotropic assumptions. One result is the appearance of artifacts which can be interpreted in terms of details of Earth structure rather than of the restrictive assumptions in the analysis.

The reason for this neglect of anisotropy is presumably...