Solving The Inverse Problem Of Electrocardiology Using Body Surface Laplacian Mapping

Abstract

The determination of epi car dial potentials is very important in the diagnosis of various cardiac disorders. It has been common practice to calculate these potentials from potentials measured on the body surface and then use a regular is at ion technique, such as that due to Tikhonov. Here it will be demonstrated that these same potentials can be determined using the recently described body surface Laplacian maps. Using a concentric spheres model, for which the surface Laplacian can be calculated analytically, a transfer matrix is calculated relating epicardial potentials to the Laplacian of the body surface potentials. The epicardial potentials are recovered by inverting this transfer matrix with the usual Tikhonov regular is at ion technique. From our initial work in this area, the determination of epicardial potentials from body surface Laplacian maps is markedly superior to those from potential measurements.