Reconstructing conductivities with boundary corrected D-bar method

The aim of electrical impedance tomography is to form an image of the conductivity distribution inside an unknown body using electric boundary measurements. The computation of the image from measurement data is a non-linear ill-posed inverse problem and calls for a special regularized algorithm. One such algorithm, the so-called D-bar method, is improved in this work by introducing new computational steps that remove the so far necessary requirement that the conductivity should be constant near the boundary. The numerical experiments presented suggest two conclusions. First, for most conductivities arising in medical imaging, it seems the previous approach of using a best possible constant near the boundary is sufficient. Second, for conductivities that have high contrast features at the boundary, the new approach produces reconstructions with smaller quantitative error and with better visual quality

Positive-energy D-bar method for acoustic tomography: a computational study

A new computational method for reconstructing a potential from the Dirichlet-to-Neumann map at positive energy is developed. The method is based on D-bar techniques and it works in absence of exceptional points -- in particular, if the potential is small enough compared to the energy. Numerical tests reveal exceptional points for perturbed, radial potentials. Reconstructions for several potentials are computed using simulated Dirichlet-to-Neumann maps with and without added noise. The new reconstruction method is shown to work well for energy values between $10^{-5}$ and $5$, smaller values giving better results

A Hybrid Segmentation and D-bar Method for Electrical Impedance Tomography

The Regularized D-bar method for Electrical Impedance Tomography provides a rigorous mathematical approach for solving the full nonlinear inverse problem directly, i.e. without iterations. It is based on a low-pass filtering in the (nonlinear) frequency domain. However, the resulting D-bar reconstructions are inherently smoothed leading to a loss of edge distinction. In this paper, a novel approach that combines the rigor of the D-bar approach with the edge-preserving nature of Total Variation regularization is presented. The method also includes a data-driven contrast adjustment technique guided by the key functions (CGO solutions) of the D-bar method. The new TV-Enhanced D-bar Method produces reconstructions with sharper edges and improved contrast while still solving the full nonlinear problem. This is achieved by using the TV-induced edges to increase the truncation radius of the scattering data in the nonlinear frequency domain thereby increasing the radius of the low pass filter. The algorithm is tested on numerically simulated noisy EIT data and demonstrates significant improvements in edge preservation and contrast which can be highly valuable for absolute EIT imaging

A Data-Driven Edge-Preserving D-bar Method for Electrical Impedance Tomography

In Electrical Impedance Tomography (EIT), the internal conductivity of a body is recovered via current and voltage measurements taken at its surface. The reconstruction task is a highly ill-posed nonlinear inverse problem, which is very sensitive to noise, and requires the use of regularized solution methods, of which D-bar is the only proven method. The resulting EIT images have low spatial resolution due to smoothing caused by low-pass filtered regularization. In many applications, such as medical imaging, it is known \emph{a priori} that the target contains sharp features such as organ boundaries, as well as approximate ranges for realistic conductivity values. In this paper, we use this information in a new edge-preserving EIT algorithm, based on the original D-bar method coupled with a deblurring flow stopped at a minimal data discrepancy. The method makes heavy use of a novel data fidelity term based on the so-called {\em CGO sinogram}. This nonlinear data step provides superior robustness over traditional EIT data formats such as current-to-voltage matrices or Dirichlet-to-Neumann operators, for commonly used current patterns.Comment: 24 pages, 11 figure

A Direct D-Bar Method for Partial Boundary Data Electrical Impedance Tomography With a Priori Information

Electrical Impedance Tomography (EIT) is a non-invasive imaging modality that uses surface electrical measurements to determine the internal conductivity of a body. The mathematical formulation of the EIT problem is a nonlinear and severely ill-posed inverse problem for which direct D-bar methods have proved useful in providing noise-robust conductivity reconstructions. Recent advances in D-bar methods allow for conductivity reconstructions using EIT measurement data from only part of the domain (e.g., a patient lying on their back could be imaged using only data gathered on the accessible part of the body). However, D-bar reconstructions suffer from a loss of sharp edges due to a nonlinear low-pass filtering of the measured data, and this problem becomes especially marked in the case of partial boundary data. Including a priori data directly into the D-bar solution method greatly enhances the spatial resolution, allowing for detection of underlying pathologies or defects, even with no assumption of their presence in the prior. This work combines partial data D-bar with a priori data, allowing for noise-robust conductivity reconstructions with greatly improved spatial resolution. The method is demonstrated to be effective on noisy simulated EIT measurement data simulating both medical and industrial imaging scenarios

Nonlinear Inversion from Partial EIT Data: Computational Experiments

Electrical impedance tomography (EIT) is a non-invasive imaging method in which an unknown physical body is probed with electric currents applied on the boundary, and the internal conductivity distribution is recovered from the measured boundary voltage data. The reconstruction task is a nonlinear and ill-posed inverse problem, whose solution calls for special regularized algorithms, such as D-bar methods which are based on complex geometrical optics solutions (CGOs). In many applications of EIT, such as monitoring the heart and lungs of unconscious intensive care patients or locating the focus of an epileptic seizure, data acquisition on the entire boundary of the body is impractical, restricting the boundary area available for EIT measurements. An extension of the D-bar method to the case when data is collected only on a subset of the boundary is studied by computational simulation. The approach is based on solving a boundary integral equation for the traces of the CGOs using localized basis functions (Haar wavelets). The numerical evidence suggests that the D-bar method can be applied to partial-boundary data in dimension two and that the traces of the partial data CGOs approximate the full data CGO solutions on the available portion of the boundary, for the necessary small $k$ frequencies.Comment: 24 pages, 12 figure

The D-bar Method for Diffuse Optical Tomography: a computational study

The D-bar method at negative energy is numerically implemented. Using the method we are able to numerically reconstruct potentials and investigate exceptional points at negative energy. Subsequently, applying the method to Diffusive Optical Tomography, a new way of reconstructing the diffusion coefficient from the associated Complex Geometrics Optics solution is suggested and numerically validated