Prestack reverse time migration（PSTM） is a common imaging method; however low-frequency noises reduce the structural imaging precision. Thus, the suppression of migration noises must be considered. The generation mechanism of low-frequency noises is analyzed and the up-, down-, left-, and right-going waves are separated using the Poynting vector of the acoustic wave equation. The computational complexity and memory capacitance of the proposed method are far smaller than that required when using the conventional separation algorithm of 2D Fourier transform. The normalized wavefield separation crosscorrelation imaging condition is used to suppress low-frequency noises in reverse time migration and improve the imaging precision. Numerical experiments using the Marmousi model are performed and the results show that the up-, down-, left-, and right-going waves are well separated in the continuation of the wavefield using the Poynting vector. We compared the imaging results with the conventional method, Laplacian filtering, and wavefield separation with the 2D Fourier transform. The comparison shows that the migration noises are well suppressed using the normalized wavefield separation cross-correlation imaging condition and higher precision imaging results are obtained.
