Comparative studies of l_p-regularization-based reconstruction algorithms for bioluminescence tomography

Inverse source reconstruction is the most challenging aspect of bioluminescence tomography (BLT) because of its ill-posedness. Although many efforts have been devoted to this problem, so far, there is no generally accepted method. Due to the ill-posedness property of the BLT inverse problem, the regularization method plays an important role in the inverse reconstruction. In this paper, six reconstruction algorithms based on l_p regularization are surveyed. The effects of the permissible source region, measurement noise, optical properties, tissue specificity and source locations on the performance of the reconstruction algorithms are investigated using a series of single source experiments. In order to further inspect the performance of the reconstruction algorithms, we present the double sources and the in vivo mouse experiments to study their resolution ability and potential for a practical heterogeneous mouse experiment. It is hoped to provide useful guidance on algorithm development and application in the related fields.