D.R. Roberti, D. Anfossi, H.F. de Campos Velho, G.A. Degrazia (2007): Estimation of Pollutant Source Emission Rate from Experimental Data, Il Nuovo Cimento (submitted).

Abstract: The estimation of the source pollutant strength is a relevant issue for atmospheric environment. This characterizes an inverse problem in the atmospheric pollution dispersion studies. In the inverse analysis, a time dependent pollutant source is considered, where the location of such source term is assumed known. The inverse problem is formulated as a non-linear optimization approach, whose objective function is given by the least square difference between the measured and simulated by the mathematical model, pollutant concentration, associated with a regularization operator. The forward problem is addressed by a Lagrangian model, and a quasi-Newton method is employed for minimizing the objective function. The second order Tikhonov regularization is applied and the regularization parameter is computed by using the L-curve scheme. The inverse problem methodology is verified with data from the tracer Copenhagen experiment.