Mathematical Physics and Harmonic Analysis Seminar
7 September 2007, Bloc 627

Title: On an inverse problem for the wave equation that arises in medical
imaging
Speaker: Peter Kuchment, TAMU

The talk describes some recent uniqueness result and inversion formulas
for a problem that arises in a new method of medical imaging, so called
thermoacoustic tomography. In this problem, one observes a solution of
the wave equation (in a medium with variable sound speed) on the lateral
boundary of a cylinder and aims to recover the initial data. This problem,
which seems to have insufficient data, can in fact be solved for the
specific imaging situation. Energy decay plays significant role in the
derivation.