Reconstruction of driving forces through recurrence plots

We consider the problem of reconstructing one-dimensional driving forces only from the observations of driven systems. We extend the approach presented in a seminal paper [M.C. Casdagli, Physica D 108 (1997) 12] and propose a method that is robust and has wider applicability. By reinterpreting the work of Thiel et al. [M. Thiel, M.C. Romano, J. Kurths, Phys. Lett. A 330 (2004) 343], we formulate the reconstruction problem as a combinatorial optimization problem and relax conditions by assuming that a driving force is continuous. The method is demonstrated by using a tent map driven by an external force.