254 IEEE JOURNAL OF ELECTROMAGNETICS, RF, AND MICROWAVES IN MEDICINE AND BIOLOGY, VOL. 4, NO.
4, DECEMBER 2020
Electromagnetic Inversion for Noninvasive Specific
Absorption Rate Characterization
Mario Phaneuf , Student Member, IEEE, and Puyan Mojabi , Member, IEEE
Abstract—The inverse source framework, which comprises a
subset of electromagnetic inversion, is applied to the noninvasive
specific absorption rate (SAR) characterization problem. An algo-
rithm is developed and presented which takes field measurements
external to the phantom and provides the electromagnetic sources
required to obtain the SAR distribution. The unique aspect of
this inverse source algorithm is that it casts the problem as the
simultaneous inversion (SI) of two sets of equivalent currents:
one for the device under test (DUT), and the other for the phantom.
The dependency of these two sets of currents is then incorporated
as an explicit regularization term in the resulting algorithm. The
method is proposed to be relatively robust in terms of measure-
ment noise. A simplified two-dimensional problem is presented to
support this proposition.
Index Terms—Electromagnetic inversion, inverse source
problem, regularization, specific absorption rate (SAR).
I. INTRODUCTION
ICROWAVE radiators, such as cellphone antennas, must
M meet the requirements set by governments and regulating
bodies on human exposure to microwave radiation. One of the
important measures is the amount of heating induced in the body
which is commonly characterized by the specific absorption rate
(SAR). When dealing with known materials, which is the case
for the human body, a SAR measurement is effectively an electric
field measurement.
Based on the measurement domain at which E-field measure-
ments are performed, SAR characterization techniques can be
classified into two categories: (1) direct (invasive) and (2) indi-
rect (noninvasive) measurements. Contemporary SAR measure-
ments are performed by taking direct electric field measurements
within a phantom [1], in the presence of the device under
test (DUT). Since the measurements are made internal to the
phantom, we refer to it as an invasive technique. The direct mea-
surement is made with a field probe attached to a mechanical arm
which scans over the phantom to obtain the SAR distribution [1].
A complete measurement must be done for different frequency
bands and modulation schemes [1]. As devices become more
Manuscript received November 18, 2019; revised February 9, 2020 and March
18, 2020; accepted March 19, 2020. Date of publication March 30, 2020; date
of current version November 20, 2020. This work was supported in part by the
National Sciences and Engineering Research Council (NSERC) of Canada and
in part by the Canada Research Chair Program. This paper was presented in part
at the IEEE International Symposium on Antennas and Propagation and USNC-
URSI Radio Science Meeting held in Atlanta, GA, USA, 2019. (Corresponding
author: Mario Phaneuf.)
The authors are with the Department of Electrical and Computer Engi-
neering, University of Manitoba, Winnipeg, MB R3T 2N2, Canada (e-mail:
phaneuf3@myumanitoba.ca; puyan.Mojabi@umanitoba.ca).
Digital Object Identifier 10.1109/JERM.2020.2983027
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sophisticated, the SAR measurement time has increased and
thus there has been a push towards alternative methods that
can reduce this time. For direct measurements, the mechanism
for reducing the measurement time is to reduce the number of
measurements, either from using known field distributions [2],
or with field propagation techniques [3]–[5]. The other alterna-
tive is to perform an indirect measurement. That is, we would
measure the fields external to the phantom (hence the term
noninvasive) and then infer the fields inside the phantom [6]–[9].
This indirect approach allows for a potentially accelerated SAR
acquisition due to avoiding internal volumetric field measure-
ments. Additionally, a noninvasive measurement would allow
for the use of solid and inhomogeneous phantoms and would
allow the use of pre-existing measurement hardware (e.g., near-
field antenna measurement systems). The indirect approach can
be thought as inferring the cause (internal fields) from external
effects (external fields); thus, it can be formulated as an electro-
magnetic inverse problem. The mathematical process of infer-
ring the cause from the effect is then referred to as inversion, and
the obtained solution is referred to as the reconstructed solution.
The electromagnetic inverse problem that is relevant to SAR
applications is the inverse source problem. Under this frame-
work, the goal is to reconstruct true or equivalent currents of
an active source from externally measured fields. Inverse source
algorithms are often used in antenna measurements to recon-
struct the equivalent currents which characterize the antenna
under test. (This approach can be useful for antenna diagnostics,
phaseless measurements, etc. [10].) Herein, we investigate the
application of the inverse source framework to the noninva-
sive SAR problem. This leads to a classification of possible
approaches, along with their advantages and disadvantages. Fol-
lowing this analysis, a novel algorithm is proposed which casts
the noninvasive SAR problem as a characterization problem for
two sets of equivalent surface currents: those of the DUT and
those of the phantom. The unique aspect of this algorithm is the
incorporation of the dependency between the equivalent currents
as an explicit regularization term. A time-dependency of ejωt is
implicitly assumed in this paper.
II. GENERAL NONINVASIVE APPROACH
Consider the setup in Fig. 1, where the DUT is radiating in the
presence of a known non-magnetic dielectric phantom, and an
external measurement device is present to record the complex
(amplitude and phase) radiated fields external to the phan-
tom. Using the inverse source framework, the goal is to use
PHANEUF AND MOJABI: ELECTROMAGNETIC INVERSION FOR NONINVASIVE SPECIFIC ABSORPTION RATE CHARACTERIZATION
Fig. 1. Noninvasive SAR measurement setup.
Fig. 2. Replacing the unknown DUT currents JDUT with equivalent surface
 Σ.
currents JΣ and M
these external field measurements to infer the fields inside the
phantom. Due to the electromagnetic uniqueness and equiva-
lence theorems, there is more than one way to formulate the
problem. We will present a classification of these methods in
the following section.
The advantages of the noninvasive approach come with its
own challenges. The main disadvantage and greatest hurdle
of any inverse problem is the inherent ill-posedness [11] of
the problem. The behavior of ill-posed problems can vary, but
all can be classified into one or many of the following three
scenarios: the problem’s solution does not exist, the solution is
not unique, or the solution is not stable. In the case of noninvasive
SAR measurements, the solution always exists. The issue of
non-uniqueness can be present when dealing with insufficient
measured data and also due to non-radiating sources [12]. The
instability issue is generally the most difficult to contain. It exists
in this problem due to the smoothing properties of the Green’s
function operator [11]. Due to this instability, a small perturba-
tion in the measured data can result in significant changes in the
reconstructed solution [11]. To stabilize the inversion process,
regularization techniques are used to choose an appropriate
solution. These regularization techniques require the choice of
an appropriate regularization weight which can be a challenging
task.
III. CLASSIFICATION OF NONINVASIVE APPROACHES
Herein, we classify a few possible approaches to the nonin-
vasive SAR problem, which are distinguished by their way of
accounting for the scattering effects of the phantom.
A. Inhomogeneous Background Approach
Consider the case where we have the DUT’s radiating cur-
rents, JDUT , in the presence of a phantom, as shown in Fig. 2.
The electric field is known through the wave equation
 = −jωμ0 JDUT ,
Hk (E)
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255
where Hk (E)  ∇×∇×E  − k2 E  in the 3D case or
 2 2
Hk (E)  −∇ E − k E in the charge-free 2D TM case. The
wavenumber is denoted by k. (We have dropped the position
vector r for simplicity.) Considering that k can vary depending
on the position, we refer to the Green’s function associated with
(1) as the inhomogeneous Green’s function. Since the phantom’s
complex permittivity profile is known, this inhomogeneous
Green’s function is obtainable (although not trivial).1 In the
noninvasive SAR approach, we know E  external to the phantom
at the measurement domain. If we use these externally measured
data to find JDUT , we can then use (1) to find E  everywhere
including within the phantom. In practice, however, we do
not know the exact DUT currents. Instead of reconstructing
JDUT on the actual antenna, we use the equivalence principle
to reconstruct equivalent currents on the reconstruction surface
Σ enclosing the antenna (see the dashed reconstruction surface
in Fig. 2 with equivalent electric and magnetic currents JΣ and
M Σ ).2 The inverse source problem is then formulated as finding
JΣ and M  Σ from
 
 JΣ
[E meas
] = [Lk ] , (2)
M Σ
where Lk is a mapping operator that incorporates the inhomo-
geneous Green’s function. Once the currents JΣ and M  Σ are
reconstructed, the fields inside the phantom, and subsequently
the SAR, can be found. This electromagnetic inverse source
problem is similar to the one used in antenna diagnostics with
the only difference being the use of the inhomogeneous Green’s
function as opposed to the free-space version.
B. Free-Space Background Approaches
With appropriate transformations, the wave equation in (1)
can be modified to require only the free-space Green’s function,
i.e., k is replaced with the free-space k0 . To this end, the physical
phantom needs to be removed from the problem and replaced
by equivalent currents which reproduce the scattering effects of
the phantom.
1) Phantom (Volumetric) Contrast Source Approach: Con-
trast sources are equivalent currents which reproduce the scat-
tering effects of dielectric materials and allows a free-space
approach to scattering problems [14]. The governing contrast
source equation can be obtained by first introducing the incident
 inc (the fields in the absence of the phantom), and then
field E
 (the fields in the presence of the phantom). We
the total field E
 scat as the difference of the total
next define the scattered field E
and incident fields. The scattered field equation can be written
as [15]
 scat ) = k 2 w.
H k 0 (E 0 (3)
In the above equation, w
 are the (volumetric) contrast sources
  χE
defined as w  where χ is the complex permittivity contrast
1 For general geometries, the inhomogeneous Green’s function will not have
a canonical form; it can be obtained implicitly by solving the forward scattering
problem [13] in the presence of the phantom when the excitation is a point source
(or a line source in 2D).
2 These currents can be reduced to a single type by assuming a perfect electric
(1) conductor or perfect magnetic conductor medium inside Σ.
256 IEEE JOURNAL OF ELECTROMAGNETICS, RF, AND MICROWAVES IN MEDICINE AND BIOLOGY, VOL. 4, NO. 4, DECEMBER 2020
Fig. 3. Replacing the phantom with equivalent surface currents JΓ and M
 Γ.
as defined in [15]. An important assumption that must be made
in obtaining (3) is the cancellation of the original currents JDUT
in the total and incident field wave equations.3 In general, due
to loading effects in SAR applications, antenna currents change
when placed close to human body [16]. Consequently, this will
invalidate (3) for SAR applications in most cases.
2) Phantom Surface Current Approach: We begin by placing
a second closed surface denoted by Γ around the phantom,
similar to the closed surface Σ for the DUT. Next, we introduce a
second set of equivalent currents which allows us to remove the
phantom, denoted by JΓ and M  Γ , shown in Fig. 3. The inverse
source problem is then formulated as finding the equivalent
currents JΣ , M Σ , JΓ , and M
 Γ from
   
    J   J
Γ Σ

E meas = Lk 0 + Lk 0 , (4)
MΓ MΣ
where Lk0 is the mapping operator incorporating the free-space
Green’s function, as opposed to Lk in (2). As can be seen, the
SAR problem has now been formulated as an inverse source
problem for two “antennas” [8]. By solving (4) under Love’s
equivalence condition, there will be a direct relation between
the phantom’s equivalent currents and the complex tangential
fields on Γ. Based on the uniqueness theorem, these tangential
surface fields can therefore be used to obtain the internal electric
fields and ultimately the SAR distribution.
Since the DUT is the only true antenna adding power to the
system, the phantom currents must be directly related to the
DUT currents through a known operator [6], [7], [9]. After this
current link is obtained, we now have an important choice to
make: either we directly substitute the link into (4) (which is
similar to previous noninvasive SAR approaches [6], [7]), or we
include it as a regularization term. In the substitution case, the
free-space approach is now more similar to the inhomogeneous
background approach with only DUT currents. In the other
approach, which we refer to as simultaneous inversion (SI),
the phantom and DUT currents are simultaneously inverted,
while limiting the possible solutions by a regularization term
incorporating the linked current operator. To the best of the
authors’ knowledge, this is the first use of the SI method for
noninvasive SAR applications. Although the two methods are
theoretically equivalent, in practice we see different results.4 In
3 The total field equation is given in (1), and the incident field wave equation
can be expressed as Hk0 (E  inc ) = −jωμ0 JDUT .
4 This is also consistent with observations in electromagnetic inverse scattering
algorithms in microwave imaging. For example, the contrast source inversion
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particular, the authors saw that the simultaneous inversion of
both the phantom and DUT currents was much less sensitive to
noise for a basic problem using synthetic noisy data. This leads
to the main speculation of this paper which is that the SI method
may be preferable to the substitution method in a practical noisy
case.
IV. FORMULATION AND IMPLEMENTATION
Herein, we present the formulation for the proposed SI
method. For simplicity, we limit ourselves to the 2D scalar case
where the phantom is assumed to be homogeneous and circular
in the x-y plane. The electric field components are in the z
direction (i.e., Ez ), and the magnetic field components are in
the x and y directions (i.e., Hx and Hy ).
A. Love’s Equivalence Condition
Under Love’s equivalence condition, the equivalent currents
are directly related to the tangential fields by
JΓ,Σ = n̂ × H,
 M Γ,Σ = −n̂ × E
 (5)
where n̂ is the outward normal vector to Γ or Σ. This is useful
for the SAR characterization problem, as solving for the equiv-
alent currents under Love’s equivalence condition will become
equivalent to solving for the complex tangential fields on Γ and
Σ. Having the tangential fields on the closed surface Γ, and
knowing the complex permittivity of the phantom, we can then
calculate the internal fields within the phantom, and ultimately
obtain the SAR distribution. Any boundary value method can
be used to obtain the internal electric field; herein, we simply
solve the forward problem [13] for the internal field using the
reconstructed DUT currents.
B. Data Misfit Cost Functional
Based on our 2D assumption, and noting (5), we have three
equivalent current components on Γ and Σ: Jz , Mx , and My .
Assuming the measured data to be Ez on a measurement domain
S outside Γ and Σ, i.e., E meas = Ez (r ∈ S), these equivalent
currents contribute to E meas as [18]
 
−ωμ0 1 y − y
E meas = Jz H02 (k0 ρ) − Mx k0 H12 (k0 ρ)
Γ,Σ 4 4j ρ

1 x − x
+ My k0 H12 (k0 ρ) d, (6)
4j ρ
where ρ = |r − r  |, d is the differential element on Γ and Σ,
2
and H0,1 denotes the zeroth (or first) order Hankel function
of the second kind. Based on (6), we can now construct a
linear operator linking the unknown equivalent currents to the
measured data as Aζ = b, where b is the vector representing the
measured data and ζ is the concatenation of two vectors p and
q such that ζ = [p; q] where p = [JΣ ; MΣ ] and q = [JΓ ; MΓ ].
Therefore, the unregularized inverse source problem will be the
minimization of the SAR data misfit cost functional Aζ − b2
over ζ where . represents the L2 norm over the measurement
domain S.
algorithm [14] simultaneously inverts χ and w  whereas the Gauss-Newton
inversion algorithm [17] utilizes the substitution and only inverts χ.
PHANEUF AND MOJABI: ELECTROMAGNETIC INVERSION FOR NONINVASIVE SPECIFIC ABSORPTION RATE CHARACTERIZATION
C. Simultaneous Inversion (SI)
The key component of the proposed algorithm is the link
between the currents, which is added as a separate regularization
term. The link between the currents will appear as q = Bp where
B is the operator linking the equivalent currents on Σ to those
on Γ.5 Using the identity matrix I, we can enforce this relation
by minimizing
Cζ2 where C = [B − I]. (7)
The data misfit cost functional can now be regularized by solving
2 2 2 reconstructed p using the substitution method can be susceptible
arg min{Aζ − b + α Cζ }, (8)
ζ to instability as the scalar β can be very large while having
where α is an appropriate regularization weight which might be
determined through algorithms such as the L-curve method [11].
We use the conjugate gradient (CG) algorithm to minimize this
functional. In all the examples shown, we always start the CG
algorithm with a trivial initial guess of zero. We also note that
we have balanced the magnitudes of the equivalent electric and
magnetic currents by the free-space wave impedance such that
the inversion algorithm does not favor one over the other [8].
V. MOTIVATION FOR SIMULTANEOUS INVERSION (SI)
We would like to briefly discuss the speculative advantages
of using the simultaneous inversion (SI) method. Consider the
original inverse source problem
arg min{Aζ − b2 } = arg min{Ap p + Aq q − b2 }, (9)
ζ p,q
where A = [Ap Aq ]. Under the substitution scheme q = Bp, the
problem becomes
arg min{Ap p + Aq Bp − b2 }. (10)
p substitution method when inverting noisy data. For the case of
It is known and expected that the operators Ap and Aq are ill-
posed which results in (9) suffering from instability.6 Consider
the candidate solution p = p + βs where p is the true solution, s
is a high spatial frequency component, and β is a real constant.
Due to the ill-posedness of Ap and Aq , these two operators act as
low-pass filters for spatial frequencies [11].7 Consequently, we
make the following approximation: Ap s ≈ Aq s ≈ 0.8 Likewise,
B is also an ill-posed operator. Let us assume that the degree of
ill-posedness of B is less than Aq . In other words, the cut-off
5 There are multiple ways of obtaining the link between the currents. In [6], [7],
the link between the currents was obtained through the PMCHW formulation.
The method used in this paper is to simply solve the volumetric forward scattering
problem [13] where the point sources (Dirac delta sources) are successively
placed at different discretized cells on Σ and the observation points are placed
at discretized cells on Γ [9, Sec. 4.2.2]. Note that this is possible due to the direct
relation between the equivalent currents and tangential fields on Γ.
6 This is the property of Fredholm integral equations of the first kind due to
their smoothing effects [11].
7 This can also be understood by the plane wave spectrum. When the fields in a
given plane are forward propagated to another plane, their high spatial frequency
components will be embedded in the evanescent part of the plane wave spectrum.
Thus, they will be dampened in the forward propagation.
8 This can also be justified based on the identity Av = σ u where v , u ,
i i i i i
and σi are the ith right singular vector, ith left singular vector, and ith singular
value respectively. In ill-posed problems, for large i indices, σi becomes very
small, and therefore Avi ≈ 0. Noting that a large i index corresponds to high
spatial frequencies, it follows that As ≈ 0.
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257
(spatial) frequency of B is higher than that of Aq . Based on
these different cut-off frequencies, assume that there exists a
high spatial frequency component s such that (i) Ap s ≈ Aq s ≈
0, (ii) Bs = s = 0, and (iii) s lies in the stopband of Aq , i.e.,
Aq s ≈ 0. Then, the norm in (10) using this candidate solution
will be
Ap p + Aq Bp − b2 = Ap (p + βs) + Aq B(p + βs) − b2 ,
≈ Ap p + Aq Bp − b2 . (11)
Since the candidate solution produces a similar norm to p, the
small effects on the norm value. In other words, the substitution
method can suffer from the presence of an effective null space.
Consider instead the simultaneous inversion approach,
arg min{Ap p + Aq q − b2 + α2 Bp − q2 }, (12)
p,q
which is an equivalent representation of (8). Evaluating the
norms for the candidate solution will result in
Ap (p + βs) + Aq q − b2 + α2 B(p + βs) − q2
2
≈ Ap p + Aq q − b2 + α2 Bp + βs − q . (13)
Unlike the substitution case, the effect of the erroneous compo-
nent s is maintained in the second norm. Therefore, the algorithm
can be more robust to instability. The relative performance of the
substitution and SI methods will depend on the relative cut-off
frequencies of A and B. In the case where they are similar, we
would expect similar results from the two methods. The cut-off
frequency is comparable to the condition number of the matrix.
Due to this instability, it is often necessary to regularize the
the SI method, the norm Bp − q provides some regularization
effects but may not be sufficient in general. Therefore, an extra
layer of regularization can be useful for the SI method as well.
Herein, we use a Krylov subspace regularization algorithm [19]
which truncates the CG algorithm early to prevent spurious
solutions. The degree of truncation, which serves as the regular-
ization weight, was chosen in an ad hoc way. Based on our nu-
merical simulations, although both techniques can benefit from
regularization, the substitution method is more sensitive to the
regularization weight (which is the degree of truncation). This
is a major advantage for the SI method in terms of robustness.
VI. RESULTS
Fig. 4 shows the setup for the simulation. Circular reconstruc-
tion surfaces Γ and Σ cover the phantom and DUT respectively.
Measurements are made on the circular domain S. The phantom
is circular and has a radius of 10.8 cm, so that it is comparable
to a human head. The phantom material has a relative complex
permittivity of εr = 41.5 − j19.4 at the frequency of 900 MHz.
The reconstruction surface Γ is centered on the phantom and has
a slightly larger radius of 12.1 cm. The DUT was chosen to be
an infinite line source. The reconstruction surface Σ is centered
on the DUT and has a radius of 1 cm. The separation distance
between Σ and Γ is d = 0.9 cm. There are 360 discretized pulses
258 IEEE JOURNAL OF ELECTROMAGNETICS, RF, AND MICROWAVES IN MEDICINE AND BIOLOGY, VOL. 4, NO. 4, DECEMBER 2020

Fig. 4. Diagram of 2D simulation. Circular reconstruction surfaces Γ (radius

of 12.1 cm) and Σ (radius of 1 cm) cover the circular phantom (radius of 10.8 cm)
and the DUT (infinite line source), respectively.

on Γ and 36 on Σ. There are 360 measurements equally spaced on

S. The synthetic measured data were generated using a method
of moments based forward solver on a 250 × 250 square grid
centered at the origin with a side length of 24 cm. The current
link B was generated using a different grid (200 × 200 square
grid with the same side length) to avoid possible inverse crime.
For the results, we focus on the reconstructed complex surface
fields on Γ, which can be used to find the internal fields and the
SAR distribution. Our chosen error metric is the relative (peak)
field error at the location nearest to the DUT. This error is defined
as |E rec − E true |/|E true | at ϕ = 0 on Γ. We will also look at the Fig. 5. Reconstruction results for the noiseless data. The reconstructed elec-
absolute error in the resulting SAR9 distribution, normalized to tric field magnitudes on Γ for 0◦ ≤ ϕ ≤ 25◦ are shown for the (a) SI and
the peak true SAR pixel value. (b) Substitution methods for two choices of Krylov subspace regularization. The
percent SAR error, normalized to the peak true SAR pixel value, for Choice 1
We start by looking at the results under the noiseless10 case. is shown for the (c) SI and (d) Substitution methods. The results for Choice 2
To demonstrate the sensitivity of the substitution method, the are likewise shown in (e)–(f).
methods were applied for two levels of Krylov subspace regu-
larization: a CG convergence tolerance11 of 10−16 (Choice 1), SAR pixel value under Choice 1 was 2.3% for the SI method
and a tolerance of 10−14 (Choice 2). Fig. 5(a)–(b) shows the and 30.7% for the substitution method, see Fig. 5(c)–(d). There
magnitude of the reconstructed phantom surface electric fields is a strong correlation between the reconstructed field accuracy
for the substitution and SI methods for both choices.12 The and the SAR accuracy. Under Choice 2, the SI reconstruction has
weight α in the SI method was found by visually inspecting barely changed (compare the two choices in Fig. 5(a)), whereas
the L-curve.13 For both methods, the majority of the field is the substitution method has considerably improved (compare
reconstructed well; it is only the area shadowed by the DUT the two choices in Fig. 5(b)). The peak field errors for the
which presents problems. The peak field errors for the SI method substitution method have now improved to 4.79% for the electric
under Choice 1 were 2.78% for the electric field and 0.64% for field and 4.16% for the magnetic field, and the peak SAR pixel
the magnetic field. The peak field errors for the substitution error improved to 6.76% (see Fig. 5(f)). On the other hand, the
method under Choice 1 were 25.5% for the electric field and errors associated with the SI method are relatively unchanged
24.7% for the magnetic field.14 The percent error in the peak when compared to the previous case, which is indicative of the
robustness of the method.
2 To evaluate the performance under noise, uniform random
pixel = (σ/ρ)|Epixel | [1], where σ
9 The SAR pixel value is given by SAR
is the phantom conductivity and ρ is the phantom density. The normalized er- noise with a magnitude at 50% of min{|E meas |} was added to
ror is defined as |SARrec rec 2
pixel − SARpixel |/ max{SARpixel } = |((σ/ρ)|Epixel | −
true true
E meas . This noisy dataset is then inverted using three different
2 2
(σ/ρ)|Epixel | )|/ max{(σ/ρ)|Epixel | }. Note that this definition eliminates the
true true
choices of regularization for the SI and substitution methods.
need for a defined σ and ρ. The three choices of convergence tolerance are 10−10 (Choice 1),
10 Although there is no added noise, there is an effective numerical noise due
to discretization error. 10−8 (Choice 2), and 10−6 (Choice 3); thus, Choice 3 offers the
11 The convergence tolerance is the value of the squared norm of the CG maximum regularization weight. Fig. 6 presents the magnitude
residual for the least-squares problem [11] implied by (8) and (10) for the SI and phase of the reconstructed electric field on Γ and Table I
and substitution methods, respectively. A larger tolerance results in fewer CG
iterations and represents a larger regularization weight. summarizes the mean (E and H) peak field errors. The most
12 The reconstructed phases for both cases, not shown here, are similar and important item to note is that the level of change in the SI recon-
reasonable. struction for the different choices of regularization is much less
13 It is assumed that it would be reasonable to obtain the weight α by an
automated L-curve searching algorithm [19].
14 Note that for the substitution method, the solution instability is reflected in ill-posed operator B filters much of the instability in p; the ultimate effect is
the DUT currents p. The error that is reported is for the phantom currents q. The actually a damped field on Γ as can be seen in Fig. 5(b).

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PHANEUF AND MOJABI: ELECTROMAGNETIC INVERSION FOR NONINVASIVE SPECIFIC ABSORPTION RATE CHARACTERIZATION
Fig. 6. Noisy data: the reconstructed electric field magnitude and phase on Γ
for 0◦ ≤ ϕ ≤ 25◦ are shown for the (a), (c) SI and (b), (d) substitution methods
for three choices of truncation (regularization weight).
TABLE I
MEAN PEAK FIELD ERRORS FOR EACH METHOD IN THE UNREGULARIZED AND
REGULARIZED CASES FOR NOISY MEASUREMENT DATA
than that in the substitution case. This can be seen in Fig. 6(a),
6(c), where the grouping of solutions for the SI method is closer
than the grouping of solutions for the substitution method. In
fact, the SI solutions for Choice 2 and Choice 3 are on top of
each other. Conversely, the substitution solutions in Fig. 6(b),
6(d) change more rapidly and are quicker to destabilize when
the CG algorithm performs additional iterations (Choice 1). It is
also worthwhile to note that the substitution method performed
the best when regularized properly. This could be explained by
noting that the early CG truncation could prevent the SI method
from satisfying Bp = q as well as before.
VII. DISCUSSION AND CONCLUSION
This paper casts the noninvasive SAR characterization prob-
lem as an electromagnetic inverse source problem with two sets
of unknowns: the equivalent surface currents of the DUT and
those of the phantom. These two sets of equivalent currents
are related through the current link equation; this can be in-
corporated by substituting this link and optimizing based on the
DUT’s equivalent currents. This paper suggests an alternative
implementation: the SI method, where the current link is utilized
as an additive regularization term for the SAR data misfit cost
functional. Since the current link is independent of noisy mea-
surement data, it can be used to partially stabilize the inversion
process. The trade-off is an increased number of unknowns
in the optimization process. In the example provided, the SI
reconstructions were less sensitive to the level of additional
regularization when compared to the substitution method. We
have also observed that the robustness of the SI method does not
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259
guarantee a more accurate reconstruction; in fact, better accu-
racy was obtained using the substitution method under proper
regularization. It remains to be seen whether these observations
persist to 3D practical cases.
ACKNOWLEDGMENT
The authors would like to acknowledge the NSERC of Canada
and the Canada Research Chair Program for their financial
support.
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