Section: Research Program

Simplified models and inverse problems

The medical and clinical exploration of the electrical signals is based on accurate reconstruction of the typical patterns of propagation of the action potential. The correct detection of these complex patterns by non-invasive electrical imaging techniques has to be developed. Both problems involve solving inverse problems that cannot be addressed with the more compex models. We want both to develop simple and fast models of the propagation of cardiac action potentials and improve the solutions to the inverse problems found in cardiac electrical imaging techniques.

The cardiac inverse problem consists in finding the cardiac activation maps or, more generally, the whole cardiac electrical activity, from high density body surface electrocardiograms. It is a new and a powerful diagnosis technique, which success would be considered as a breakthrough in the cardiac diagnosis. Although widely studied during the last years, it remains a challenge for the scientific community. In many cases the quality of reconstructed electrical potential is not sufficiently accurate. The methods used consist in solving the Laplace equation on the volume delimited by the body surface and the epicardial surface. We want to

• Study in depth the dependance of this inverse problem inhomogeneities in the torso, conductivity values, the geometry, electrode placements...

• Improve the solution to the inverse problem be using new regularization strategies and the theory of optimal control, both in the quasistatic and in the dynamic contexts.

Of course we will use our models as a basis to regularize these inverse problems. We will conside the follwong strategies:

• using complete propagation models in the inverse problem, like the bidomain equations; for instance in order to localize electrical sources;

• construct families of reduced-order models, using e.g. statistical learning techniques, which would accurately represent some families of well-identified pathologies; and

• construct simple models of the propagation of the activation front, based on eikonal or level-sets equations, but which would incorporate the representation of complex activation patterns.

Additionaly, we will need to develop numerical techniques dedicated to our simplified eikonal/level-set equations.