Journal of Applied Mathematics and Physics, 2014, 2, 771-782
Published Online July 2014 in SciRes. http://www.scirp.org/journal/jamp
http://dx.doi.org/10.4236/jamp.2014.28085
How to cite this paper: Dassios, G. and Satrazemi, K. (2014) Inversion of Meg Data for a 2-D Current Distribution. Journal of
Applied Mathematics and Physics, 2, 771-782. http://dx.doi.org/10.4236/jamp.2014.28085
Inversion of Meg Data for a 2-D Current
Distribution
George Dassios, Konstantia Satrazemi
Department of Chemical Engineering, University of Patras and ICE/HT-FORTH, Patras, Greece
Email: gdassios@otenet.gr
Received 4 May 2014; revised 2 June 2014; accepted 12 June 2014
Copyright © 2014 by authors and Scientific Research Publishing Inc.
This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution International License (CC BY).
http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/
Abstract
The support of a localized three-dimensional neuronal current distribution, within a conducting
medium, is not identifiable from knowledge of the exterior magnetic flux density, obtained via
Magnetoencephalographic (MEG) measurements. However, this is not true if the neuronal current
is supported on a set with dimensionality less than three. That is, the support of a dipolar current
distribution can be recovered if it is a set of isolated points, a segment of a curve, or a surface
patch. In this work we provide an analytic algorithm for this inverse MEG problem and apply it to
the case where the current is supported on a localized disk having arbitrary position and size
within the brain tissue. The proposed recovery algorithm reduces the identification of the charac-
teristics of the current to the solution of a nonlinear algebraic system, which can be handled nu-
merically.
Keywords
Magnetoencephalography, Inversion of Current
1. Introduction
Magnetoencephalography associates a neuronal current within the functional brain with the magnetic flux den-
sity and it creates outside the head. In particular, the direct problem consists of the calculation of the exterior
magnetic field when the primary neuronal current is given, and the inverse problem seeks to identify the current
that generates a given exterior magnetic field. The main difficulty with the inverse problem of Magnetoence-
phalography is due to the fact that, besides the excitation of the neuronal current within the conductive brain tis-
sue, a secondary induction current is generated which, in a sense, makes the primary neuronal current less “visi-
ble” by the exterior magnetic field. The induction current is supported on the conductive brain tissue and there-
fore it depends on the geometry of the brain-head system. Even for relatively simple geometrical models such as