Connections between three-dimensional inverse scattering and linear least-squares estimation of random fields

The three-dimensional Schrödinger equation inverse scattering problem with a nonspherically-symmetric potential is related to the filtering problem of computing the linear leastsquares estimate of the three-dimensional random field on the surface of a sphere from noisy observations inside the sphere. The relation consists of associating an estimation problem with the inverse scattering problem, and vice-versa. This association allows equations and quantities for one problem to be given interpretations in terms of the other problem. A new fast algorithm is obtained for the estimation of random fields using this association. The present work is an extension of the connections between estimation and inverse scattering already known to exist for stationary random processes and one-dimensional scattering potentials, and isotropic random fields and radial scattering protentials.