Shallow neural network yields regularization for ill-posed inverse problems

In this paper, we develop a regularization theory for neural network approximations of general ill-posed operator equations with noisy data. Within the framework of iterative regularization, we introduce two expanding neural network methods (ENNs) under different a priori assumptions on the exact solution. Instead of prescribing a fixed architecture, ENNs adaptively select the number of neurons through an a posteriori stopping rule, so that the selected network size serves as a regularization parameter balancing approximation accuracy and stability with respect to data noise. We prove the regularization properties of the proposed ENNs and establish quantitative relationships between the selected network size and the noise level. Within the framework of variational regularization, we propose a neural network-based Tikhonov scheme and derive both convergence and convergence-rate results under mild assumptions. The resulting estimates account for the noise level, the network size, and the underlying smoothness expressed through general variational source conditions, thereby allowing greater flexibility than existing results. Numerical experiments demonstrate the effectiveness and robustness of the proposed algorithms. In particular, they show that, for highly noisy data, relatively small network architectures can already produce stable reconstructions, whereas excessively large architectures may degrade stability due to overfitting.