Inverse analysis of material parameters in coupled multi-physics biofilm models

Abstract: In this article we propose an inverse analysis algorithm to find the best fit of multiple material parameters in different coupled multi-physics biofilm models. We use a nonlinear continuum mechanical approach to model biofilm deformation that occurs in flow cell experiments. The objective function is based on a simple geometrical measurement of the distance of the fluid biofilm interface between model and experiments. A Levenberg-Marquardt algorithm based on finite difference approximation is used as an optimizer. The proposed method uses a moderate to low amount of model evaluations. For a first presentation and evaluation the algorithm is applied and tested on different numerical examples based on generated numerical results and the addition of Gaussian noise. Achieved numerical results show that the proposed method serves well for different physical effects investigated and numerical approaches chosen for the model. Presented examples show the inverse analysis for multiple parameters in biofilm models including fluid-solid interaction effects, poroelasticity, heterogeneous material properties and growth.