Patent ID: 7690838

Claim:
A thermal property measurement apparatus comprising: temperature detecting means for measuring temperature at plural positions in a 3D, 2D or 1D ROI (region of interest) within a target; storage means for storing temperature data representing the temperature measured over the ROI by the temperature detecting means together with position data representing the plural positions where the temperature is measured and time data representing time when the temperature is measured; processing means for calculating at least one thermal property distribution selected from among thermal conductivity distribution, thermal capacity distribution, thermal diffusivity distribution, heat transfer coefficient distribution, convection distribution, heat source distribution, heat sink distribution, distribution of ratio of thermal conductivity and density, distribution of ratio of thermal conductivity and specific heat, distribution of ratio of heat transfer coefficient and density, distribution of ratio of heat transfer coefficient and specific heat, density distribution, specific heat distribution, temporal change of one of these distributions, and frequency variance of one of these distributions, by solving regularized linear normal equations about said at least one thermal property distribution obtained from at least one heat transfer equation having coefficients determined on the basis of the temperature data, the position data, and the time data stored in said storage means by using discrete approximation and least-squares minimization together with regularization using at least one penalty term including at least one of a square of said at least one thermal property distribution, a square of a gradient of said at least one thermal property distribution, a square of a Laplacian of said at least one thermal property distribution, and a square of at least one of first and second temporal partial derivatives of said at least one thermal property distribution without using a sensitivity theorem; and control means for controlling the temperature detecting means, storage means and processing means.