Stability for quantitative photoacoustic tomography revisited

Abstract: This paper is concerned with the stability issue in determining absorption and diffusion coefficients in quantitative photoacoustic imaging. Assuming that the optical wave is generated by point sources in a region where the optical coefficients are known, we derive pointwise H{\"o}lder stability estimate of the inversion. This result shows that the reconstruction of the optical coefficients is stable in the region close to the optical illumination sources and deteriorate exponentially far away. Our stability estimate is therefore in accordance with known experimental observations. Mathematics subject classification : 35R30.