Distorted Wave Extended Phaseless Rytov Iterative Method for Inverse Scattering Problems

Abstract: In this work we present a novel linear iterative solution to an electromagnetic inverse scattering problem with phaseless data for strongly scattering, lossy media. It is based on an extended Rytov approximation that significantly widens the validity range of the conventional Rytov approximation. By modifying this extension and including it in a distorted wave iterative formulation, accurate reconstruction results for both the real and imaginary components of permittivity can be obtained. We denote the technique as the distorted wave extended phaseless Rytov iterative method (DxPRIM) and we present its derivation and numerical formulation. Using simulation and experimental examples, we demonstrate that DxPRIM can reconstruct strong, lossy scatterers with phaseless measurement data and show that it outperforms state-of-the-art phaseless techniques.