Compressive sampling-based scattering data acquisition in microwave imaging

ABSTRACT

The design of systems for data acquisition in microwave imaging is addressed. First, the collection of scattering data is formulated within a Compressive Sampling (CoSamp) framework. The arising problem is then solved by minimizing the bound of the restricted isometry constant (RIC) of the observation matrix mathematically modelling the acquisition setup. Towards this end, a new incoherence-based RIC bound is derived to take into account the physics of the microwave imaging system. A set of numerical experiments is reported to assess the information acquisition capabilities of the proposed approach as well as its impact on the performance of the subsequent Compressive Sensing (CoSens)-based inversion in comparison with standard Nyquist–Shannon-based sampling techniques, as well.

KEYWORDS:

• Compressive processing
• compressive sampling
• microwave imaging
• contrast source imaging

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s)

Notes

1 Let us remember that every imaging problem is sparse subject to the choice of a suitable representation basis [4,13].

2 For notation conciseness, the double summation $\sum _{p=1}^S\sum _{q=1}^S$ is shortened in $\sum _{1<p,q<S}$.

3 Canonical profiles have been chosen to enable a direct comparison with state-of-the-art results [24,27], as well as to derive general guidelines suitable for several different applicative scenarios.

4 The SNR is defined on the scattered field magnitude [24,25,27].

5 It is worth remarking that, owing to the strong non-linearity of the ODA cost function, it is not possible to guarantee that the obtained $\mathbf{R}$ is the global optimum. Accordingly, an even better accuracy may be obtained within the proposed framework using different optimization parameters/setups.

6 “Similar” and not “the same” since not only the data-collection influences the reconstruction, but it also depends on the data inversion step.

7 The computation of $M^{Nyquist}$ has been carried out considering once again the formulas in [22,23] as applied to the $L=3\lambda$ investigation domain.

Additional information

Funding

This work benefited from the networking activities within the Project “CYBER-PHYSICAL EM VISION: Context-Aware Electromagnetic Sensing and Smart Reaction (EMvisioning)” [grant number 2017HZJXSZ] – PRIN2017 Program (CUP: E64I19002530001), the Project “Cloaking Metasurfaces for a New Generation of Intelligent Antenna Systems (MANTLES)” [grant number 2017BHFZKH] – PRIN2017 Program (CUP: E64I19000560001), the Project “MITIGO Mitigazione dei rischi naturali per la sicurezza e la mobilita' nelle aree montane del Mezzogiorno” [grant number ARS01_00964] within the Program “Progetti di Ricerca Industriale e Sviluppo Sperimentale nelle 12 aree di specializzazione individuate dal PNR 2015-2020”, Specialization Area “Smart Secure and Inclusive Communities” [grant number SCN_00166] – Program “Smart cities and communities and Social Innovation” (CUP: E44G14000040008). All these projects funded by the Italian Ministry of Education, University, and Research, and the Project "National Centre for HPC, Big Data and Quantum Computing (CN HPC)" fundedby the European Union - NextGenerationEU within the PNRR Program (CUP: E63C22000970007)

Notes on contributors

Giacomo Oliveri

Giacomo OLIVERI received the B.S. and M.S. degrees in Telecommunications Engineering and the PhD degree in Space Sciences and Engineering from the University of Genoa, Italy, in 2003, 2005, and 2009 respectively. He is currently an Associate Professor at the University of Trento and a Board Member of the ELEDIA Research Center. Moreover, he is Adjunct Professor at CentraleSupélec and member of the Laboratoire des signaux et systèmes (L2S)@CentraleSupélec Gif-sur-Yvette (France). He has been a visiting researcher at L2S in 2012, 2013, and 2015, Invited Associate Professor at the University of Paris Sud, France, in 2014, and visiting professor at Université Paris-Saclay in 2016 and 2017.He is author/co-author of over 400 peer reviewed papers on international journals and conferences. His research work is mainly focused on electromagnetic direct and inverse problems, system-by-design and metamaterials, and antenna array synthesis. Prof. Oliveri serves as an Associate Editor of the IEEE Antennas and Wireless Propagation Letters, of the IEEE Journal on Multiscale and Multiphysics Computational Techniques, of EPJ Applied Metamaterials, of the International Journal of Antennas and Propagation, of the International Journal of Distributed Sensor Networks, of the Microwave Processing journal, and of the Sensors journal. He is a Senior Member of the IEEE, and the Chair of the IEEE AP/ED/MTT North Italy Chapter.

Nicola Anselmi

Nicola ANSELMI (Senior Member IEEE) received the Master Degree in Telecommunication Engineering from the University of Trento, Italy, in 2012, and the Ph.D. degree from the International Doctoral School in Information and Communication Technology, Trento, Italy, in 2018. He is currently Assistant Professor at the Department of Civil, Environmental, and Mechanical Engineering (DICAM) at the University of Trento, and a Research Fellow of the ELEDIA Research Center.Dr. Anselmi is a member of the IEEE Antennas and Propagation Society, he serves as an Associate Editor of the IEEE Antennas and Wireless Propagation Letters and of the IEEE Open Journal of Antennas and Propagation, and as a reviewer for different international journals including IEEE Transactions on Antennas and Propagation, IEEE Antennas and Wireless Propagation Letters, and IET on Microwaves, Antennas & Propagation. His research activities are mainly focused on synthesis methods for unconventional antenna array architectures, tolerance analysis of antenna systems, and electromagnetic inverse scattering techniques, with interest on compressive sensing methodologies for microwave imaging applications.In 2023 Dr. Anselmi received the Italian National Scientific Qualification for the position of Full Professor, and in 2019 the Qualification  aux  fonctions  de maître de conférences. Moreover, he has been the recipient of the "Giorgio Barzilai" award for Young Researchers by the Italian Electromagnetic Society (SIEM) in 2016, of the  "Young  Scientist"  Prize  by  the  Applied Computational Electromagnetics Society (ACES) in 2018, and of the "Mini‐Circuits Harvey Kaylie Best Paper Prize" by  the  IEEE International  Conference  on  Microwaves, Communications, Antennas & Electronic Systems (COMCAS) in 2019.

Marco Salucci

Marco S ALUCCI (Senior Member, IEEE)  received the M.S. degree in Telecommunication Engineering from the University of Trento, Italy, in 2011, and the Ph.D. degree from the International Doctoral School in Information and Communication Technology of Trento in 2014. He was a Post Doc Researcher at CentraleSupélec, in Paris, France, and a Post Doc Researcher at the Commissariat à l'énergie atomique et aux énergies alternatives (CEA), France. He is currently Assistant Professor at the Department of Civil, Environmental, and Mechanical Engineering (DICAM) at the University of Trento, and a Research Fellow of the ELEDIA Research Center. Dr. Salucci is a Member of the IEEE Antennas and Propagation Society and he was a Member of the COST Action TU1208 "Civil Engineering Applications of Ground Penetrating Radar". He is the Associate Editor for Communications and Memberships of the IEEE Transactions on Antennas and Propagation. Moreover, he serves as an Associate Editor of the IEEE Transactions on Antennas and Propagation and of the IEEE Open Journal of Antennas and Propagation, and as a reviewer for different international journals including IEEE Transactions on Antennas and Propagation, IEEE Transactions on Microwave Theory and Techniques, IEEE Journal on Multiscale and Multiphysics Computational Techniques, and IET Microwaves, Antennas & Propagation. His research activities are mainly concerned with inverse scattering, biomedical and GPR microwave imaging techniques, antenna synthesis, and computational electromagnetics with focus on System-by-Design methodologies integrating optimization techniques and artificial intelligence for real-world applications.

Lorenzo Poli

Lorenzo POLI received the M.S. degrees in Telecommunication Engineering from the University of Trento, Italy, in 2008, and the PhD degree from the International Doctoral School in Information and Communication Technology in 2012. He is currently Assistant Professor at the Department of Civil, Environmental, and Mechanical Engineering (DICAM) at the University of Trento, and a Research Fellow of the ELEDIA Research Center.Dr. Poli is author/co-author of more than 60 journals and 90 conference papers. He is a member of the IEEE Antennas and Propagation Society since 2010, when he was a recipient of the IEEE Antennas and Propagation Society Doctoral Research Award. He was a Visiting Researcher at the Laboratoire des Signaux et Systèmes (L2S@Supèlec, France) in 2015 and a Visiting Professor at the University of Paris Sud (France) in 2016. Dr. Poli serves as a reviewer for several international journals including IEEE Transactions on Antennas and Propagation, IEEE Antennas and Wireless Propagation Letters, and IET Microwaves, Antennas & Propagation. His research activities are focused on the solution of antenna design and unconventional array synthesis problems as well as electromagnetic inverse scattering problems.

Andrea Massa

Andrea MASSA (IEEE Fellow, IET Fellow, Electromagnetic Academy Fellow) received the Laurea (M.S.) degree in Electronic Engineering from the University of Genoa, Genoa, Italy, in 1992 and the Ph.D. degree in EECS from the same university in 1996. He is currently a Full Professor of Electromagnetic Fields at the University of Trento, where he currently teaches electromagnetic fields, inverse scattering techniques, antennas and wireless communications, wireless services and devices, and optimization techniques.At present, Prof. Massa is the director of the network of federated laboratories ELEDIA Research Center (www.eledia.org) located in Brunei, China, Czech, France, Greece, Italy, Japan, Perù, Tunisia with more than 150 researchers. Moreover, he is holder of a Chang-Jiang Chair Professorship @ UESTC (Chengdu China), Visiting Research Professor @ University of Illinois at Chicago (Chicago USA), Visiting Professor @ Tsinghua (Beijing - China), Visiting Professor @ Tel Aviv University (Tel Aviv Israel), and Professor @ CentraleSupélec (Paris - France). He has been holder of a Senior DIGITEO Chair at L2S-CentraleSupélec and CEA LIST in Saclay (France), UC3M-Santander Chair of Excellence @ Universidad Carlos III de Madrid (Spain), Adjunct Professor at Penn State University (USA), Guest Professor @ UESTC (China), and Visiting Professor at the Missouri University of Science and Technology (USA), the Nagasaki University (Japan), the University of Paris Sud (France), the Kumamoto University (Japan), and the National University of Singapore (Singapore). He has been appointed IEEE AP-S Distinguished Lecturer (2016-2018) and served as Associate Editor of the "IEEE Transaction on Antennas and Propagation" (2011-2014). Prof. Massa serves as Associate Editor of the International Journal of Microwave and Wireless Technologies and he is member of the Editorial Board of the Journal of Electromagnetic Waves and Applications, a permanent member of the PIERS Technical Committee and of the EuMW Technical Committee, and a ESoA member. He has been appointed in the Scientific Board of the Società Italiana di Elettromagnetismo (SIEm) and elected in the Scientific Board of the Interuniversity National Center for Telecommunications (CNIT). He has been appointed in 2011 by the National Agency for the Evaluation of the University System and National Research (ANVUR) as a member of the Recognized Expert Evaluation Group (Area 09, Industrial and Information Engineering) for the evaluation of the researches at the Italian University and Research Center for the period 2004-2010. Furthermore, he has been elected as the Italian Member of the Management Committee of the COST Action TU1208 Civil Engineering Applications of Ground Penetrating Radar.His research activities are mainly concerned with inverse problems, analysis/synthesis of antenna systems and large arrays, radar systems synthesis and signal processing, cross?layer optimization and planning of wireless/RF systems, semantic wireless technologies, system-by-design and material?by?design (metamaterials and reconfigurable?materials), and theory/applications of optimization techniques to engineering problems (tele-communications, medicine, and biology).Prof. Massa published more than 900 scientific publications among which more than 350 on international journals (> 15.000 citations  h-index = 65 [Scopus]; > 12.000 citations  h-index = 59 [ISI-WoS]; > 23.000 citations  h-index = 89 [Google Scholar]) and more than 550 in international conferences where he presented more than 200 invited contributions (> 40 invited keynote speaker) (www.eledia.org/publications). He has organized more than 100 scientific sessions in international conferences and has participated to several technological projects in the national and international framework with both national agencies and companies (18 international prj, > 5 M; 8 national prj, > 5 M; 10 local prj, > 2 M; 63 industrial prj, > 10 M; 6 university prj, > 300 K).