Inverse solution of thermoacoustic wave equation for cylindrical layered media

Abstract

Thermoacoustic imaging is a crossbred approach taking advantages of electromagnetic and ultrasound disciplines, together. A significant number of current medical imaging strategies are based on reconstruction of source distribution from information collected by sensors over a surface covering the region to be imaged. Reconstruction in thermoacoustic imaging depends on the inverse solution of thermoacoustic wave equation. Homogeneous assumption of tissue to be imaged results in degradation of image quality. In our paper, inverse solution of the thermoacoustic wave equation using layered tissue model consisting of concentric annular layers on a cylindrical cross-section is investigated for cross-sectional thermoacustic imaging of breast and brain. By using Green’s functions and surface integral methods we derive an exact analytic inverse solution of thermoacoustic wave equation in frequency domain. Our inverse solution is an extension of conventional solution to layered cylindrical structures. By carrying out simulations, using numerical test phantoms consisting of thermoacoustic sources distributed in the layered model, our layered medium assumption solution was tested and benchmarked with conventional solutions based on homogeneous medium assumption in frequency domain. In thermoacoustic image reconstruction, where the medium is assumed as homogeneous medium, the solution of nonhomogeneous thermoacoustic wave equation results in geometrical distortions, artifacts and reduced image resolution due to inconvenient medium assumptions.