The surface Laplacian operator of the potentials on a bounded volume conductor has a unique inverse.

Abstract

In the discussion on the use of the surface Laplacian (SL) of the distribution of bioelectric potentials on the body surface, the question remained open whether a complete specification of the SL of the potential over the surface bounding a volume conductor would uniquely specify the potential on that surface up to a constant. This paper reports that this is indeed the case. In addition, it is shown that the integral of the SL over a closed surface is zero, a property that may serve as a check on the accuracy of any numerical approximation of the SL.