Scattering tomography method and scattering tomography device

Patent metadata

Field	Value
Publication number	US-10101282-B2
Application number	US-201615262448-A
Country	US
Kind code	B2
Filing date	Sep 12, 2016
Priority date	Mar 12, 2014
Publication date	Oct 16, 2018
Grant date	Oct 16, 2018

Abstract

A scattering tomography method includes: radiating waves to an object from a plurality of transmitting antenna elements aligned on a side surface of a case; receiving scattered waves by a plurality of receiving antenna elements aligned on the side surface of the case; and reconstructing an image relating to information on an interior of the object using scattered wave data representing the scattered waves. In the reconstructing, a reconstruction function for reconstructing the image relating to the information on the interior of the object is set in advance for a three-dimensional space having the same shape as the case, a scattering field equation which the reconstruction function satisfies is constructed, a visualization function that is obtained by solving the scattering field equation is derived from the scattered wave data, and the image relating to the information on the interior of the object is reconstructed using the visualization function.

First claim

The invention claimed is:

1. A scattering tomography method for analyzing scattered waves of waves radiated to an object placed in a case, the scattering tomography method comprising:
radiating the waves to the object from a plurality of transmitting antenna elements aligned on a side surface of the case in a same direction as an axis of rotational symmetry of the case when seen in a plan view;
receiving the scattered waves by a plurality of receiving antenna elements aligned on the side surface of the case in the same direction as the axis of rotational symmetry of the case when seen in a plan view; and
reconstructing an image relating to information on an interior of the object using scattered wave data representing the scattered waves received by the plurality of receiving antenna elements,
wherein in the reconstructing:
a reconstruction function for reconstructing the image relating to the information on the interior of the object is set in advance for a three-dimensional space having a same shape as the case;
a scattering field equation whose solution is the reconstruction function is constructed, the scattering field equation being a linear partial differential equation whose solution is a scattering field in which the scattered waves are present at each point in a space that (i) is defined by independent variables representing positions of, among the plurality of transmitting antenna elements and the plurality of receiving antenna elements, a transmitting antenna element and a receiving antenna element that correspond to two arbitrary points inside the object, and (ii) has as many dimensions as a total number of the independent variables representing the positions of the transmitting antenna element and the receiving antenna element;
a visualization function is derived from the scattered wave data, the visualization function (i) being limits of a time variable and a space variable of a function obtained by solving the linear partial differential equation and (ii) involving an angle θ of rotation of a tangent plane about the axis of rotational symmetry of the case, the tangent plane being a plane tangent to the case at the positions of the transmitting antenna element and the receiving antenna element; and
the image relating to the information on the interior of the object is reconstructed using a function obtained by integrating the visualization function with respect to the angle θ.

2. The scattering tomography method according to claim 1 ,
wherein the visualization function is represented by Expression C, and
the function obtained by integrating the visualization function with respect to the angle θ is represented by Expression D,

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Assignees

• Univ Kobe Nat Univ Corp
• Integral Geometry Science Inc

Inventors

• Kimura Kenjiro
• Kimura Noriaki

Classifications

• G01N22/02 Primary

  Investigating the presence of flaws · CPC title

• G01N22/00 Primary

  Investigating or analysing materials by the use of microwaves or radio waves, i.e. electromagnetic waves with a wavelength of one millimetre or more (G01N3/00 - G01N17/00, G01N24/00 take precedence) · CPC title

• G06T12/00

  Tomographic reconstruction from projections · CPC title

• G06T11/003

  Physics · mapped topic