Boundary shape reconstruction with Robin condition: existence result, stability analysis, and inversion via multiple measurements

Abstract: This study revisits the problem of identifying the unknown interior Robin boundary of a connected domain using Cauchy data from the exterior region of a harmonic function. It investigates two shape optimization reformulations employing least-squares boundary-data-tracking cost functionals. Firstly, it rigorously addresses the existence of optimal shape solutions, thus filling a gap in the literature. The argumentation utilized in the proof strategy is contingent upon the specific formulation under consideration. Secondly, it demonstrates the ill-posed nature of the two shape optimization formulations by establishing the compactness of the Riesz operator associated with the quadratic shape Hessian corresponding to each cost functional. Lastly, the study employs multiple sets of Cauchy data to address the difficulty of detecting concavities in the unknown boundary. Numerical experiments in two and three dimensions illustrate the numerical procedure relying on Sobolev gradients proposed herein.