Finite-element-based photoacoustic tomography in time domain

We describe a finite element reconstruction algorithm for time-domain photoacoustic tomography. The algorithm is based on an iterative Newton method coupled with the time-domain Helmholtz-like photoacoustic wave equation subject to the first-order Bayliss-Turkel radiation boundary conditions. The algorithm is tested and evaluated using a series of simulated and tissue-like phantom data where objects are embedded in a circular background. The results show that quantitatively accurate photoacoustic images can be recovered using our time-domain reconstruction algorithm.