Underwater topography detection of Taiwan Shoal with SAR images

Under suitable conditions of tidal current and wind, underwater topography can be detected by synthetic aperture radar (SAR) indirectly. Underwater topography SAR imaging includes three physical processes: radar ocean surface backscattering, the modulation of sea surface short wave spectrum by the variations in sea surface currents, and the modulation of sea surface currents by the underwater topography. The first process is described usually by Bragg scattering theory because the incident angle of SAR is always between 20°-70°. The second process is described by the action balance equation. The third process is described by an ocean hydrodynamic model. Based on the SAR imaging mechanism for underwater topography, an underwater topography SAR detection model and a simplified method for its calculation are introduced. In the detection model, a two-dimensional hydrodynamic model – the shallow water model is used to describe the motion of tidal current. Due to the difficulty of determining the expression of SAR backscattering cross section in which some terms can not be determined, the backscattering cross section of SAR image used in the underwater topography SAR detection is pro-processed by the simulated SAR image of the coarse-grid water depth to simplify the calculation. Taiwan Shoal, located at the southwest outlet of Taiwan Strait, is selected as an evaluation area for this technique due to the occurrence of hundreds of sand waves. The underwater topography of Taiwan Shoal was detected by two scenes of ERS-2 SAR images which were acquired on 9 January 2000 and 6 June 2004. The detection results are compared with in situ measured water depths for three profiles. The average absolute and relative errors of the best detection result are 2.23 m and 7.5 %, respectively. These show that the detection model and the simplified method introduced in the paper is feasible.     

SEDIMENTARY ENVIRONMENT IN TAIWAN SHOAL

Taiwan Shoal sediments are well sorted and rounded medium-coarse sands eontaining a large amount of shell and beach rock fragments and basalt gravels, and are of deltaic, coastal and eolian origin. Underwater sand waves are formed by the combined tidal currents and are remolded by storm waves.     

Repair wind field in oil contaminated areas with SAR images

In this paper,we compared the normalized radar cross section in the cases of oil spill,biogenic slicks,and clean sea areas with image samples made from 11-pixel NRCS average,and determined their thresholds of the NRCS of the synthetic aperture radar. The results show that the thresholds of oil and biogenic slicks exhibit good consistency with the corresponding synthetic aperture radar images. In addition,we used the normalized radar cross section of clean water from adjacent patches of oil or biogenic slicks areas to replace that of oil or biogenic slicks areas,and retrieve wind field by CMOD5.n and compare wind velocity mending of oil and biogenic slicks areas with Weather Research and Forecasting modeled data,from which the root mean squares of wind speed(wind direction) inversion are 0.89 m/s(20.26°) and 0.88 m/s(7.07°),respectively. Therefore,after the occurrence of oil spill or biogenic slicks,the real wind field could be repaired using the method we introduced in this paper. We believe that this method could improve the accuracy in assessment of a real wind field on medium and small scales at sea,and enhance effectively the monitoring works on similar oil or biogenic slicks incidents at sea surface.     

Preformance evaluation of several fusion approaches for CCD/SAR images

Several image fusion approaches for CCD/SAR images are studied and the performance evaluation of these fusion approaches is completed in this paper. Firstly, the preprocessing of CCD/SAR images before fusion is fulfilled. Then, the image fusion methods including linear superposition, nonlinear operator method and multiresolution methods, of which the multiresolution methods include Laplacian pyramid, ratio pyramid, contrast pyramid, gradient pyramid, morphological pyramid and discrete wavelet transform, are adopted to fuse two types of images. Lastly, the four performance measures, standard deviation, entropy, cross entropy and spatial frequency, are calculated to compare the fusion results by different fusion approaches in this paper. Experimental results show that contrast pyramid, morphology pyramid and discrete wavelet transformation in multiresolution approaches are more suitable for CCD/SAR image fusion than other ones proposed in this paper and the objective performance evalution of CCD/SAR image fusion approaches are effective. Foundation item: Under the auspices of Astronautical Innovation Fund of China. Biography: WANG Yan-li (1977 – ), female, a native of Xi’an City, Shaanxi Province, Ph. D. candidate of School of Automation Science and Electrical Engineering, Beijing University of Aeronautics and Astronautics, specialized in scene matching, image registration and fusion.     

SAR image coregistration using fringe definition detection

In order to overcome the limitation of cross correlation coregistration method for Synthetic Aperture Radar(SAR) interferometric pairs with low coherence,a new image coregistration algorithm based on Fringe Definition Detection(FDD) is presented in this paper.The Fourier transformation was utilized to obtain spectrum characteristics of interferometric fringes.The ratio between spectrum mean and peak was proposed as the evaluation index for identifying homologous pixels from interferometric images.The satellites ERS-1/2 C-band SAR acquisitions covering the Yangtze River plain delta,eastern China and ALOS/PALSAR L-band images over the Longmen Shan mountainous area,southwestern China were respectively employed in the experiment to validate the proposed coregistration method.The testing results suggested that the derived Digital Elevation Model(DEM) from FDD method had good agreement with that from the cross correlation method as well as the reference DEM at high coherence area.However,The FDD method achieved a totally improved topographic mapping accuracy by 24 percent in comparison to the cross correlation method.The FDD method also showed better robustness and achieved relatively higher performance for SAR image coregistration in mountainous areas with low coherence.     

Seismotectonics of the Taiwan Shoal region in the northeastern South China Sea: Insights from the crustal structure

A cluster of earthquakes occurred in the Taiwan Shoal region on the outer rise of the Manila Trench. Although most were of small to medium magnitudes, one strong earthquake occurred on September 16, 1994. Several previous studies have provided important information to progress our understanding of this single earthquake. However, little is currently known about the earthquake cluster, and it is necessary to investigate the deep crustal structure of the Taiwan Shoal region to understand the mechanisms involved in controlling and generating it. This study presents a two-dimensional seismic tomographic image of the crustal structure along the OBS2012 profile based on ocean-bottom seismograph (OBS) data, which exhibits a high-velocity anomaly flanked by low-velocity anomalies in the upper crust beneath the Taiwan Shoal. In this study, 765 earthquakes (Richter magnitude M_L > 1.5) occurring between 1991 and 2015 were studied and analyses of earthquake epicenters, regional faults, and the crustal structure provides an improved understanding of the nature of active tectonics in this region. Results of analyses indicate firstly that the high-velocity area represents major asperities that correspond to the location of the earthquake cluster and where stress is concentrated. It is also depicted that the earthquake cluster was influenced by fault interactions. However, the September 1994 earthquake occurred independently of these seismic activities and was associated with reactivation of a preexisting fault. It is also determined that slab pull is resisted by the exposed precollision accretionary prism, and the resistive force is causing accumulation of inplane compressive-stress. This may trigger a future damaging earthquake in the Taiwan Shoal region.     

全方向M型心动图像的边界检测

全方向M型心动图的边界是采样线血液与腔室壁组织结构形成的分界线与采样线交点位置变化的按时间展开.提出了一种检测其边界的方法,即基于线状模板的在有限区域内搜索的边界检测算法,并结合人工干预和曲线插值技术,实现对全方向M型心动图边界的准自动提取.这种方法能较好地得到心动图的边界,为其进一步的运动特征的提取和定量分析提供了条件.     

Detection of ocean internal waves based on Faster R-CNN in SAR images

Ocean internal waves appear as irregular bright and dark stripes on synthetic aperture radar(SAR) remote sensing images. Ocean internal waves detection in SAR images consequently constituted a difficult and popular research topic. In this paper, ocean internal waves are detected in SAR images by employing the faster regions with convolutional neural network features(Faster R-CNN) framework; for this purpose, 888 internal wave samples are utilized to train the convolutional network and identify internal waves. The experimental results demonstrate a 94.78% recognition rate for internal waves, and the average detection speed is 0.22 s/image. In addition, the detection results of internal wave samples under dif ferent conditions are analyzed. This paper lays a foundation for detecting ocean internal waves using convolutional neural networks.     

A fast,edge-preserving,distance-regularized model with bilateral fi ltering for oil spill segmentation of SAR images

Marine oil spills are among the most signifi cant sources of marine pollution. Synthetic aperture radar(SAR) has been used to improve oil spill observations because of its advantages in oil spill detection and identifi cation. However, speckle noise, weak boundaries, and intensity inhomogeneity often exist in the oil spill regions of SAR imagery, which will seriously aff ect the accurate identifi cation of oil spills. To enhance marine oil spill segmentation of SAR images, a fast, edge-preserving framework based on the distance-regularized level set evolution(DRLSE) model was proposed. Specifi cally, a bilateral fi lter penalty term is designed and incorporated into the DRLSE energy function(BF-DRLSE) to preserve the edges of oil spills, and an adaptive initial box boundary was selected for the DRLSE model to reduce the operation time complexity. Two sets of RadarSat-2 SAR data were used to test the proposed method. The experimental results indicate that the bilateral filtering scheme incorporated into the energy function during level set evolution improved the stability of level set evolution. Compared with other methods, the proposed improved BF-DRLSE algorithm displayed a higher overall segmentation accuracy(97.83%). In addition, using an appropriate initial box boundary for the DRLSE method accelerated the global search process, improved the accuracy of oil spill segmentation, and reduced computational time. Therefore, the results suggest that the proposed framework is eff ective and applicable for marine oil spill segmentation.     

Parameterized first-guess spectrum method for retrieving directional spectrum of swell-dominated waves and huge waves from SAR images

A method to retrieve ocean wave spectra from SAR images, named Parameterized First-guess Spectrum Method (PFSM), was proposed after interpretation of the theory to ocean wave imaging and analysis of the drawbacks of the retrieving model generally used. In this method, with additional information and satellite parameters, the separating wave-number is first calculated to determine the maximum wave-number beyond which the linear relation can be used. The separating wave-number can be calculated using the additional information on wind velocity and parameters of SAR satellite. And then the SAR spectrum can be divided into SAR spectrum of wind wave and of swell according to the result of separating wave-number. The portion of SAR spectrum generated by wind wave, is used to search for the most suitable parameters of ocean wind wave spectrum, including propagation direction of ocean wave, phase speed of dominating wave and the angle spreading coefficient. The swell spectrum is acquired by directly inversing the linear relation of ocean wave spectrum to SAR spectrum given the portion of SAR spectrum generated by swell. We used the proposed method to retrieve the ocean wave spectrum from ERS-SAR data from the South China Sea and compared the result with altimeter data. The agreement indicates that the PFSM is reliable.     

Object-based classification of cloudy coastal areas using medium-resolution optical and SAR images for vulnerability assessment of marine disaster

Efficient and accurate access to coastal land cover information is of great significance for marine disaster prevention and mitigation. Although the popular and common sensors of land resource satellites provide free and valuable images to map the land cover, coastal areas often encounter significant cloud cover, especially in tropical areas, which makes the classification in those areas non-ideal. To solve this problem, we proposed a framework of combining medium-resolution optical images and synthetic aperture radar(SAR) data with the recently popular object-based image analysis(OBIA) method and used the Landsat Operational Land Imager(OLI) and Phased Array type L-band Synthetic Aperture Radar(PALSAR) images acquired in Singapore in 2017 as a case study. We designed experiments to confirm two critical factors of this framework: one is the segmentation scale that determines the average object size, and the other is the classification feature. Accuracy assessments of the land cover indicated that the optimal segmentation scale was between 40 and 80, and the features of the combination of OLI and SAR resulted in higher accuracy than any individual features, especially in areas with cloud cover. Based on the land cover generated by this framework, we assessed the vulnerability of the marine disasters of Singapore in 2008 and 2017 and found that the high-vulnerability areas mainly located in the southeast and increased by 118.97 km2 over the past decade. To clarify the disaster response plan for different geographical environments, we classified risk based on altitude and distance from shore. The newly increased high-vulnerability regions within 4 km offshore and below 30 m above sea level are at high risk; these regions may need to focus on strengthening disaster prevention construction. This study serves as a typical example of using remote sensing techniques for the vulnerability assessment of marine disasters, especially those in cloudy coastal areas.     

Land cover change detection in West Jilin using ETM ＋ images

In order to assess the information content and accuracy of Landsat ETM digital images in land cover change detection,change-detection techniques of image differencing, normalized difference vegetation index,principal components analysis and tasseled-cap transformation were applied to yield 13 images. These images were thresholded into change and no change areas. The thresholded images were then checked in terms of various accuracies. The experiment results show that kappa coefficients of the 13 images range from 48.05-78.09. Different images do detect different types of changes. Images associated with changes in the near-inflared-reflectance or greenness detects crop-type changes and changes between vegetative and non-vegetative features. A unique means of using only Landsat imagery without reference data for the assessment of change in arid land are presented. Images of 12t June, 2000 and 2‘d June, 2002 are used to validate the means. Analyses of standard accuracy and spatial agreement are performed to compare the new images (hereafter called “change images” ) representing the change between the two dates. Spatial agreement evaluates the conformity in the classified “change pixels” and “no-change pixels” at the same location on different change images and comprehensively examines the different techniques. This method would enable authorities to monitor land degradation efficiently and aeculately.     

Land cover change detection in West Jilin using ETM+ images

In order to assess the information content and accuracy ofLandsat ETM+ digital images in land cover change detection,change-detection techniques of image differencing,normalized difference vegetation index,principal components analysis and tasseled-cap transformation were applied to yield 13 images. These images were thresholded into change and no change areas. The thresholded images were then checked in terms of various accuracies. The experiment results show that kappa coefficients of the 13 images range from 48.05 ～78.09. Different images do detect different types of changes. Images associated with changes in the near-infrared-reflectance or greenness detects crop-type changes and changes between vegetative and non-vegetative features. A unique means of using only Landsat imagery without reference data for the assessment of change in arid land are presented. Images of 12th June, 2000 and 2nd June, 2002 are used to validate the means. Analyses of standard accuracy and spatial agreement are performed to compare the new images (hereafter called "change images" ) representing the change between the two dates. Spatial agreement evaluates the conformity in the classified "change pixels" and "no-change pixels" at the same location on different change images and comprehensively examines the different techniques. This method would enable authorities to monitor land degradation efficiently and accurately.     

Rossby waves with linear topography in barotropic fluids

Rossby waves are the most important waves in the atmosphere and ocean, and are parts of a large-scale system in fluid. The theory and observation show that, they satisfy quasi-geostrophic and quasi-static equilibrium approximations. In this paper, solitary Rossby waves induced by linear topography in barotropic fluids with a shear flow are studied. In order to simplify the problem, the topography is taken as a linear function of latitude variable y, then employing a weakly nonlinear method and a perturbation method, a KdV （Korteweg-de Vries） equation describing evolution of the amplitude of solitary Rossby waves induced by linear topography is derived. The results show that the variation of linear topography can induce the solitary Rossby waves in barotropic fluids with a shear flow, and extend the classical geophysical theory of fluid dynamics.     

EDGE DETECTION METHOD OF REMOTE SENSING IMAGES BASED ON MATHEMATICAL MORPHOLOGY OF MULTI-STRUCTURE ELEMENTS

This paper puts forward an effective, specific algorithm for edge detection. Based on multi-structure elements of gray mathematics morphology, in the light of difference between noise and edge shape of RS images, the paper establishes multi-structure elements to detect edge by utilizing the grey form transformation principle. Compared with some classical edge detection operators, such as Sobel Edge Detection Operator, LOG Edge Detection Operator, and Canny Edge Detection Operator, the experiment indicates that this new algorithm possesses very good edge detection ability, which can detect edges more effectively, but its noise-resisting ability is relatively low. Because of the bigger noise of remote sensing image, the authors probe into putting forward other edge detection method based on combination of wavelet directivity checkout technology and small-scale Mathematical Morphology finally. So, position at the edge can be accurately located, the noise can be inhibited to a certain extent and the effect of edge detection is obvious.     

STUDY ON PHOTOSYNTHETIC PARAMETERS AND PRIMARY PRODUCTION OF MARINE PHYTOPLANKTON IN MINNAN-TAIWAN SHOAL

Carbon assimilation rates were determined in situ in the Minnan-Taiwan Shoal with the C-14 tracer method. Seasonal variations of photosynthetic parameters of marine phytoplankton were measured together with determination of Chl a and carbon content, Experimental results indicated that the average carbon-specific carbon accumulation rate is 0.85 d~(-1), mean primary productivity is 0.55 g C (m~2d)~(-1). Temperature effect on the growth of the algae can be described by the modle of Goldman and Carpenter. Supplementation of nutrients brought up by the upwelling in summer caused the observably higher primary productivities in autumn.     

地形对台风影响的数值模拟研究——以台风“泰利”为例

为研究台湾岛地形对台风移动路径及结构的影响,利用高分辨率中尺度MM5V3模式,设计3组敏感性试验,对“0513”号台风“泰利”在2005年8月31日00：06到9月1日18：00（世界时）影响台湾岛的过程进行数值模拟研究。主要就台湾岛地形对台风移动路径、气压场、散度场、涡度场和降水场进行分析。试验结果表明：台湾岛地形对台风“泰利”的移动路径和中心气压的影响不显著;地形的强迫作用对台风涡度场的中心强度和非对称结构有明显的影响;台湾岛地形是形成迎风坡诱生低压和背风坡诱生高压的主要因子;地形是台风外围降水加强的主要原因。     

合成孔径雷达星座发展综述

自1978年第一颗星载SAR——Seasat-A发射以来,世界主要航天大国相继发射了多颗SAR卫星。几十年来,星载SAR传感器的性能不断提高,向着高分辨率、多极化、多模式和星座化等趋势发展。德国和意大利分别完成了SAR-Lupe(5颗)和COSMO-Sky Med(4颗)SAR卫星星座的布署,用于军事侦察或军民两用,欧空局和加拿大也正在积极开发SAR星座任务,甚至一些商业公司也开始研发小卫星SAR星座。SAR星座能够显著提高对地观测能力,既可以通过编队飞行进行双/多站、多角度或干涉成像,还可以通过多星组网大大缩短重访周期,满足对重点区域的密集观测需求。在SAR传感器和卫星平台都越来越小型化、低成本的背景下,星座组网正成为SAR对地观测发展的主要方向之一。