Recent progress in inverse problems in electrocardiology

The considerable progress achieved in the inverse problem of electrocardiography over the last decade has provided grounds for optimism about the possibility of approaching significant clinically relevant applications in the next decade. However, there are a number of basic questions that still remain. In addressing these questions, the authors feel it is important to seek solutions that emphasize physiological rather than mathematical significance. This approach leads to twin requirements for useful inverse solutions: accuracy, defined in a physiologically meaningful (and not just averaged and mathematical) sense, and reliability, not only to measurement noise but also to geometric modeling errors and other uncertainties that are inescapable in practical application. Studies using analytically tractable models may still be relevant, but it seems more important to find solutions to practical inverse problems, which will move the field toward wider acceptance and credibility.