From Time-Reversal Mirrors to Matrix Imaging

  • Speaker
  • Mathias Fink, Ph.D.Professor, ESPCI Paris
Date & Time


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Can we make a wave revive its past life? The development of ‘time-reversal mirrors’ for different types of waves — ultrasound, microwave and visible light — has made it possible to exploit time reversibility. Such devices bounce waves back and forth with a target like a game of tennis, with the waves becoming more focused over time. These instruments offer original solutions for imaging complex disordered environments.

In this lecture, Mathias Fink will show how medical imaging of complex tissues with light or ultrasound in reflection mode can be revisited based on the concept of time-reversal processors. He will show that, with a multi-illumination strategy, recording a reflection matrix from this media provides enough information to compensate for any distortion effects in the tissues. This is the domain of ‘matrix imaging’ developed for ultrasound imaging and deep optical coherent tomography (OCT).

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• Be aged 18 or older
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About the Speaker

Fink’s area of research concerns the propagation of waves in complex media and the development of numerous instruments. His current research interests include medical imaging, wireless communications, wave control in complex media and metamaterials. His research has resulted in seven start-up companies totally over 500 employees. He is the founder of the Langevin Institute and a member of the French Academy of Science and the National Academy of Technologies of France.

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