Determination of leading coefficients in Sturm-Liouville operator from boundary measurements. I: A stripping algorithm (Q1855106)

A stripping algorithm for the determination of the unknown coefficient \(k\in K = \{ f \in L_2[a,b] \mid f\) is monotone and uniformly bounded\} in the Sturm-Liouville operator \(Au(x) \equiv -k(x)u'(x))'=q(x)u(x)\), \(x \in (a,b)\) from boundary measurements is presented. The formulation of the problem is based on the Tikhonov's quasi-solution approach. As \(K\) is compact in \(L_2[a,b]\), the inverse problem has at least one quasi-solution in \(K\). The stripping algorithm is implemented for the cases where the unknown function \(k\) is interpolated by the first- and second-order polynomials. The effectiveness of the method is illustrated by numerical examples.