Unique Determination of the Shape of a Scattering Screen from a Passive Measurement

Abstract

We consider the problem of fixed frequency acoustic scattering from a sound-soft flat screen. More precisely, the obstacle is restricted to a two-dimensional plane and interacting with an arbitrary incident wave, it scatters acoustic waves to three-dimensional space. The model is particularly relevant in the study and design of reflecting sonars and antennas, cases where one cannot assume that the incident wave is a plane wave. Our main result is that given the plane where the screen is located, the far-field pattern produced by any single arbitrary incident wave determines the exact shape of the screen, as long as it is not antisymmetric with respect to the plane. This holds even for screens whose shape is an arbitrary simply connected smooth domain. This is in contrast to earlier work where the incident wave had to be a plane wave, or more recent work where only polygonal scatterers are determined.