A new Likelihood Ratio for supervised classification of fully polarimetric SAR data: An application for sea ice type mapping

One of the potential applications of polarimetric Synthetic Aperture Radar (SAR) data is the classification of land cover, such as forest canopies, vegetation, sea ice types, and urban areas. In contrast to single or dual polarized SAR systems, full polarimetric SAR systems provide more information about the physical and geometrical properties of the imaged area. This paper proposes a new Bayes risk function which can be minimized to obtain a Likelihood Ratio (LR) for the supervised classification of polarimetric SAR data. The derived Bayes risk function is based on the complex Wishart distribution. Furthermore, a new spatial criterion is incorporated with the LR classification process to produce more homogeneous classes. The application for Arctic sea ice mapping shows that the LR and the proposed spatial criterion are able to provide promising classification results. Comparison with classification results based on the Wishart classifier, the Wishart Likelihood Ratio Test Statistic (WLRTS) proposed by Conradsen et al. (2003) and the Expectation Maximization with Probabilistic Label Relaxation (EMPLR) algorithm are presented. High overall classification accuracy of selected study areas which reaches 97.8% using the LR is obtained. Combining the derived spatial criterion with the LR can improve the overall classification accuracy to reach 99.9%. In this study, fully polarimetric C-band RADARSAT-2 data collected over Franklin Bay, Canadian Arctic, is used.     

利用多源数据对海冰密集度反演的算法验证

海冰密集度对全球气候变化研究有重要的意义,其反演结果的验证工作也被广泛关注,但结合多源数据反演,同时对两种算法验证的研究较少的现状,该文利用ASPeCt船测海冰密集度数据对Bootstrap算法和NASA Team(NT)算法基于SSM/I数据估算的海冰密集度精度进行验证,并与MODIS影像反演获得的海冰密集度进行对比。研究结果显示两种海冰密集度算法获得的反演结果与ASPeCt船测值偏差分别为2.26%和7.27%,均方根误差分别为11.39%和12.32%。相比之下,MODIS结果与ASPeCt船测海冰密集度比较得到偏差为3%,均方根误差为5.21%。Bootstrap算法、NT算法与ASPeCt船测值比较的偏差和均方根误差显示两种算法精度相近;由于MODIS数据分辨率与ASPeCt船测数据相近,所以其反演精度较优;但因时空分辨率的限制,各种结果都具有一定的不确定性。     

利用CryoSat-2卫星测高资料确定北极海冰干舷高

卫星测高技术的发展使得大空间尺度探测海冰成为可能,海冰干舷高是反演海冰厚度的关键参量,获取精确的海冰干舷高对海冰探测及了解全球气候变化均具有重要的作用。本文基于近3年获取的CryoSat-2卫星SAR模式测高资料,在60°N—88°N纬度带内的北极海域通过设定阈值筛选可用的观测数据,并在此基础上计算2015—2017年间月平均海冰干舷高,最后通过IceBridge航飞数据的时空匹配验证了本文获取的干舷高计算结果是可靠的。     

多尺度邻域特征下的机载LiDAR点云电力线分类

利用机载激光雷达技术三维测量精度高且获取快速的优点进行电力线自动分类提取已成为点云数据处理与电力应用的重要领域。针对电力线分类模型的自动化和高精度需求,本文提出了基于三维多尺度邻域特征的机载LiDAR点云电力线分类提取模型框架,主要包括4个步骤：电力线候选点滤波、多尺度邻域类型选取、形状结构特征提取和支持向量机分类。通过对2个复杂城市区域的试验数据集和8种不同邻域类型的详细结果对比分析,发现基于多尺度圆球邻域形状结构特征的分类模型结果准确率、召回率和质量分别达到97%、94%和93%,同时整体处理时间在2个试验数据中分别从366、256 s减少到274、160 s。试验结果表明,该方法在多种复杂城市场景中能够实现机载LiDAR数据的电力线较高精度分类提取。     

基于Sentient-1A的波罗的海沿岸固定冰形变研究

为研究沿岸固定冰的形变特征,本文基于2018年1—3月连续获取的5景Sentient-1A雷达数据,利用差分合成孔径雷达干涉测量(D-InSAR)技术对波罗的海东北部的沿岸固定冰进行了探测.阐述了重复轨道雷达差分干涉测量探测固定冰形变的基本原理及数据处理流程,并结合气象观测数据分析了固定冰形变产生的原因.研究指出:3个...     

Optical classification of waters in the eastern arabian sea

The optical properties in a non-spectral mode covering Photosynthetically Active Radiation (PAR) was estimated in the Arabian Sea in the west coast of India. The attenuation coefficients, light transmittance and K/c ratio were found useful for classification of water bodies in the coastal and offshore region. High values of turbidity and Chlorophyll-a in coastal waters associated with comparatively higher values of diffusive attenuation coefficients for upwelling and downwelling irradiances. On the basis of attenuation coefficients and K/c ratio derived from upwelling and downwelling irradiances, the water bodies were classified as defincd by Jerlov (1976). The coastal waters are classified under Jerlov water types of 3 to 9, whereas those of offshore are falling under the categories Ia, Ib and II.     

联合多代测高数据建立中国海域重力异常模型

本文联合T/P数据、T/P新轨道数据、ERS数据、GFO数据、GeosatGM数据和ERS-1/168数据,用测高卫星记录点的位置信息直接计算沿轨大地水准面的方向导数,结合测线轨迹方向的方位角在交叉点处推求垂线偏差,然后利用逆Vening-Meinesz公式计算了中国近海(0o～41oN,105o～132oN)2′×2′格网分辨率的海域重力异常模型。将其与CLS_SHOW99重力异常模型比较,统计结果表示与该模型差异的RMS为8.15mgal,在剔除差值大于20mgal的点(剔除3.3%)以后,RMS为4.72mgal;与某海区船测重力异常比较的RMS为8.91mgal。     

Land cover classification of finer resolution remote sensing data integrating temporal features from time series coarser resolution data

Land cover classification of finer resolution remote sensing data is always difficult to acquire high-frequency time series data which contains temporal features for improving classification accuracy. This paper proposed a method of land cover classification with finer resolution remote sensing data integrating temporal features extracted from time series coarser resolution data. The coarser resolution vegetation index data is first fused with finer resolution data to obtain time series finer resolution data. Temporal features are extracted from the fused data and added to improve classification accuracy. The result indicates that temporal features extracted from coarser resolution data have significant effect on improving classification accuracy of finer resolution data, especially for vegetation types. The overall classification accuracy is significantly improved approximately 4% from 90.4% to 94.6% and 89.0% to 93.7% for using Landsat 8 and Landsat 5 data, respectively. The user and producer accuracies for all land cover types have been improved.     

Improving gravity anomalies over China marginal sea from retracked Geosat and ERS-1 data

The quality of altimeter data and ocean tide model is critical to the recovery of coastal gravity anomalies. In this contribution, three retracking methods (threshold, improved threshold and Beta-5) are investigated with the aim of improving the altimeter data over a shallow water area. Comparison indicates that the improved threshold is the best retracking method over China Sea. Two ocean tide models, NAO99b and CSR4.0, are analyzed. Results show that different tide models used in the processing of altimeter data may result in differences more than 10 mGal in recovered coastal gravity anomalies. Also, NAO99b is more suitable than CSR4.0 over the shallow water area of China Sea. Finally, gravity anomalies over China Sea are calculated from retracked Geosat/GM and ERS-1/GM data by least squares collocation. Comparison with shipborne gravimetry data demonstrates that gravity anomalies from retracked data are significantly superior to those from non-retracked data. Our results have the same order as the other two altimeter-derived gravity models: Sandwell&Smith(V16) and DNSC08.     

Simulation of the Ku-band Radar altimeter sea ice effective scattering surface

A radiative transfer model is used to simulate the sea ice radar altimeter effective scattering surface variability as a function of snow depth and density. Under dry snow conditions without layering these are the primary snow parameters affecting the scattering surface variability. The model is initialized with in situ data collected during the May 2004 GreenIce ice camp in the Lincoln Sea (73/spl deg/W; 85/spl deg/N). Our results show that the snow cover is important for the effective scattering surface depth in sea ice and thus for the range measurement, ice freeboard, and ice thickness estimation.     

Object-based urban land cover classification using rule inheritance over very high-resolution multisensor and multitemporal data

Very high spatial and temporal resolution remote sensing data facilitate mapping highly complex and diverse urban environments. This study analyzed and demonstrated the usefulness of combined high-resolution aerial digital images and elevation data, and its processing using object-based image analysis for mapping urban land covers and quantifying buildings. It is observed that mapping heterogeneous features across large urban areas is time consuming and challenging. This study presents and demonstrates an approach for formulating an optimal land cover classification rule set over small representative training urban area image, and its subsequent transfer to the multisensor, multitemporal images. The classification results over the training area showed an overall accuracy of 96%, and the application of rule set to different sensor images of other test areas resulted in reduced accuracies of 91% for the same sensor, 90% and 86% for the different sensors temporal data. The comparison of reference and classified buildings showed ±4% detection errors. Classification through a transferred rule set reduced the classification accuracy by about 5%–10%. However, the trade-off for this accuracy drop was about a 75% reduction in processing time for performing classification in the training area. The factors influencing the classification accuracies were mainly the shadow and temporal changes in the class characteristics.     

Surface roughness signatures of summer arctic snow-covered sea ice in X-band dual-polarimetric SAR

ABSTRACT

Surface roughness of sea ice is primary information for understanding sea ice dynamics and air–ice–ocean interactions. Synthetic aperture radar (SAR) is a powerful tool for investigating sea ice surface roughness owing to the high sensitivity of its signal to surface structures. In this study, we explored the surface roughness signatures of the summer Arctic snow-covered first-year sea ice in X-band dual-polarimetric SAR in terms of the root mean square (RMS) height. Two ice campaigns were conducted for the first-year sea ice with dry snow cover in the marginal ice zone of the Chukchi Sea in August 2017 and August 2018, from which high-resolution (4 cm) digital surface models (DSMs) of the sea ice were derived with the help of a terrestrial laser scanner to obtain the in situ RMS height. X-band dual-polarimetric (HH and VV) SAR data (3 m spatial resolution) were obtained for the 2017 campaign, at a high incidence angle (49.5°) of TerraSAR-X, and for the 2018 campaign, at a mid-incidence angle (36.1°) of TanDEM-X 1–2 days after the acquisition of the DSMs. The sea ice drifted during the time between the SAR and DSM acquisitions. As it is difficult to directly co-register the DSM to SAR owing to the difference in spatial resolution, the two datasets were geometrically matched using unmanned aerial vehicle (4 cm resolution) and helicopter-borne (30 cm resolution) photographs acquired as part of the ice campaigns. A total of five dual-polarimetric SAR features―backscattering coefficients at HH and VV polarizations, co-polarization ratio, co-polarization phase difference, and co-polarization correlation coefficient ―were computed from the dual-polarimetric SAR data and compared to the RMS height of the sea ice, which showed macroscale surface roughness. All the SAR features obtained at the high incidence angle were statistically weakly correlated with the RMS height of the sea ice, possibly influenced by the low backscattering close to the noise level that is attributed to the high incidence angle. The SAR features at the mid-incidence angle showed a statistically significant correlation with the RMS height of the sea ice, with Spearman’s correlation coefficient being higher than 0.7, except for the co-polarization ratio. Among the intensity-based and polarimetry-based SAR features, HH-polarized backscattering and co-polarization phase difference were analyzed to be the most sensitive to the macroscale RMS height of the sea ice. Our results show that the X-band dual-polarimetric SAR at mid-incidence angle exhibits potential for estimation of the macroscale surface roughness of the first-year sea ice with dry snow cover in summer.     

Crop classification and acreage estimation in North Korea using phenology features

In North Korea, reliable and timely information on crop acreage and spatial distribution is hard to obtain. In this study, we developed a fast and robust method to estimate crop acreage in North Korea using time-series normalized difference vegetation index (NDVI) derived from the Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) data. We proposed a method to identify crop type based on NDVI phenology features using data collected in other areas with similar agri-environmental conditions to mitigate the shortage of ground truth data. Eventually the classification map (MODIScrop) was assessed using the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) statistical data and high-resolution crop classification maps derived from one Landsat scene (LScrop). The Pareto boundary method was used to assess the accuracy and crop distribution of the MODIScrop maps. Results showed that acreage derived from the MODIScrop maps was generally consistent with that reported in the FAO data (a relative error <4.1% for rice and <6.1% for maize, and <9.0% for soybean except for in 2004, 2008, and 2009) and the maps derived from the LScrop (a relative error about 5% in 2013, and 7% in 2008 and 2014). The classification accuracy reached 74.4%, 69.8%, and 73.1% of the areas covered by the Landsat images in 2008, 2013, and 2014, respectively. This indicates that features derived from NDVI profiles were able to characterize major crops, and the approaches developed in this study are feasible for crop mapping and acreage estimation in regions with limited ground truth data.     

Cloud classification in NOAA AVHRR imageries using spectral and textural features

Clouds contribute significantly to the formation of many of the natural hazards. Hence cloud mapping and its classification becomes a major component of the various physical models which are used for forecasting natural hazards. The problem of cloud data classification from NOAA AVHRR (advance very high resolution radiometer) satellite imagery using image transformation techniques is considered in this paper. The singular value decomposition (SVD) scheme is used to extract the salient spectral and textural features attributed to satellite snow and cloud data in visible and IR channels. The goals of this paper are to discriminate between clear sky and clouds in an 8 × 8 pixel array of 1.1 km AVHRR data. If clouds are present then classify them as low, medium or high range. This scheme can effectively segregate clouds and non-cloud features in the visible and IR bands of the imagery. It can also classify clouds as low, medium or high range with a success rate of 70–90%. Computer-based snow and cloud discrimination and automatic cloud classification system will help the forecaster in various climatological applications, viz., energy balance estimation, precipitation forecasting, landslide forecasting, weather forecasting and avalanche forecasting etc.     

地表覆盖分类成果质量特征分析

自我国全面建成地理国情普查成果库之后,工作重心由全面普查变为重点监测。不论普查还是监测,准确地对地表覆盖进行分类一直是工作的重点和难点。在常态化监测阶段,把握地表覆盖分类成果的主要质量指标,归纳其诸如变化率、变化区域分布、变化类型,分析影响其成果质量的主要因素,对监测生产组织及质量控制具有非常重要的作用。     

Slicks detection on the sea surface based upon polarimetric SAR data

This letter proposes a generalized-likelihood ratio test-based edge detector to be fed by possibly polarimetric synthetic aperture radar (SAR) data. It can be used to detect dark spots on the sea surface and, hence, as the first stage of a system for identification and monitoring of oil spills. The proposed constant false alarm rate (CFAR) detector does not require secondary data (namely pixels from a slick-free area); remarkably, a preliminary performance assessment, carried out by resorting to real SAR recordings, shows that it guarantees detection capabilities comparable to those of previously proposed polarimetric CFAR detectors (which though make use of secondary data). The preliminary performance assessment also seems to indicate that processing polarimetric data does not ensure improved detection capabilities.     

多源遥感数据在南极冰雪变化监测中的应用研究

正南极独特的地理环境和恶劣的自然条件给南极冰雪变化的系统研究带来了种种限制,直到卫星遥感技术的发展为相关研究提供了新的技术与方法。然而,在南极冰雪环境快速变化的前提下,单一的遥感传感器难以满足人类对南极的持续监测;因此,多源遥感数据在南极冰雪变化监测中的应用研究成为了南极科学研究与遥感技术研究双双发展的必然。本文使用光学遥感影像、主动微波遥感影像及被动微波遥感影像等多源遥感数据,分别在南极局部区域与     

Tree species classification in subtropical forests using small-footprint full-waveform LiDAR data

The accurate classification of tree species is critical for the management of forest ecosystems, particularly subtropical forests, which are highly diverse and complex ecosystems. While airborne Light Detection and Ranging (LiDAR) technology offers significant potential to estimate forest structural attributes, the capacity of this new tool to classify species is less well known. In this research, full-waveform metrics were extracted by a voxel-based composite waveform approach and examined with a Random Forests classifier to discriminate six subtropical tree species (i.e., Masson pine (Pinus massoniana Lamb.)), Chinese fir (Cunninghamia lanceolata (Lamb.) Hook.), Slash pines (Pinus elliottii Engelm.), Sawtooth oak (Quercus acutissima Carruth.) and Chinese holly (Ilex chinensis Sims.) at three levels of discrimination. As part of the analysis, the optimal voxel size for modelling the composite waveforms was investigated, the most important predictor metrics for species classification assessed and the effect of scan angle on species discrimination examined. Results demonstrate that all tree species were classified with relatively high accuracy (68.6% for six classes, 75.8% for four main species and 86.2% for conifers and broadleaved trees). Full-waveform metrics (based on height of median energy, waveform distance and number of waveform peaks) demonstrated high classification importance and were stable among various voxel sizes. The results also suggest that the voxel based approach can alleviate some of the issues associated with large scan angles. In summary, the results indicate that full-waveform LIDAR data have significant potential for tree species classification in the subtropical forests.     

Multiple-entity based classification of airborne laser scanning data in urban areas

There are two main challenges when it comes to classifying airborne laser scanning (ALS) data. The first challenge is to find suitable attributes to distinguish classes of interest. The second is to define proper entities to calculate the attributes. In most cases, efforts are made to find suitable attributes and less attention is paid to defining an entity. It is our hypothesis that, with the same defined attributes and classifier, accuracy will improve if multiple entities are used for classification. To verify this hypothesis, we propose a multiple-entity based classification method to classify seven classes: ground, water, vegetation, roof, wall, roof element, and undefined object. We also compared the performance of the multiple-entity based method to the single-entity based method.Features have been extracted, in most previous work, from a single entity in ALS data; either from a point or from grouped points. In our method, we extract features from three different entities: points, planar segments, and segments derived by mean shift. Features extracted from these entities are inputted into a four-step classification strategy. After ALS data are filtered into ground and non-ground points. Features generalised from planar segments are used to classify points into the following: water, ground, roof, vegetation, and undefined objects. This is followed by point-wise identification of the walls and roof elements using the contextual information of a building. During the contextual reasoning, the portion of the vegetation extending above the roofs is classified as a roof element. This portion of points is eventually re-segmented by the mean shift method and then reclassified.Five supervised classifiers are applied to classify the features extracted from planar segments and mean shift segments. The experiments demonstrate that a multiple-entity strategy achieves slightly higher overall accuracy and achieves much higher accuracy for vegetation, in comparison to the single-entity strategy (using only point features and planar segment features). Although the multiple-entity method obtains nearly the same overall accuracy as the planar-segment method, the accuracy of vegetation improves by 3.3% with the rule-based classifier. The multiple-entity method obtains much higher overall accuracy and higher accuracy in vegetation in comparison to using only the point-wise classification method for all five classifiers.Meanwhile, we compared the performances of five classifiers. The rule-based method provides the highest overall accuracy at 97.0%. The rule-based method provides over 99.0% accuracy for the ground and roof classes, and a minimum accuracy of 90.0% for the water, vegetation, wall and undefined object classes. Notably, the accuracy of the roof element class is only 70% with the rule-based method, or even lower with other classifiers. Most roof elements have been assigned to the roof class, as shown in the confusion matrix. These erroneous assignments are not fatal errors because both a roof and a roof element are part of a building. In addition, a new feature which indicates the average point space within the planar segment is generalised to distinguish vegetation from other classes. Its performance is compared to the percentage of points with multiple pulse count in planar segments. Using the feature computed with only average point space, the detection rate of vegetation in a rule-based classifier is 85.5%, which is 6% lower than that with pulse count information.     

Rule-based classification of high-resolution imagery over urban areas in New York City

This paper describes the integration of results from different feature extraction algorithms using spectral and spatial attributes to detect specific urban features. Methodology includes segmentation of IKONOS data, computing attributes for creating image objects and classifying the objects with fuzzy logic and rule-based algorithms. Previous research reported low class accuracies for two specific classes – dark and grey roofs. A modified per-field approach was employed to extract urban features. New rule-sets were used on image objects having similar or near-similar spectral and spatial characteristics. Different algorithms using spectral and spatial attributes were developed to extract specific urban features from a time-series of Multi-Spectral Scanner (MSS) (4 m × 4 m) IKONOS data. The modified approach resulted in a remarkable improvement in the accuracy of classes that registered low spectral seperability and therefore low accuracy. The spectral and spatial based classification model may be useful in mapping heterogeneous and spectrally similar urban features.