Variational Bayesian independent component analysis for spectral unmixing in remote sensing image

Spectral unmixing is a key technology of optical remote sensing image analysis; it not only influences the accuracy of the extraction of land cover information and automatic classification of topographical objects, but also greatly hinders the development of quantitative remote sensing. Independent component analysis (ICA) is a statistical method which is recently developed to extract the independent linear components, and which can realize the extraction of endmembers as well as fractional abundances with little a priori knowledge. However, ICA still cannot process the correlations among the various components. To overcome this problem, variational Bayesian independent component analysis (VBICA) has been proposed to process optical remote sensing images. In the Bayesian framework, the separation of independent components of remote sensing image has finally been achieved with conditional independence standards of Bayesian network and approximate variational algorithm. In the simulative image and real AVIRIS hyperspectral remote sensing image, the VBICA algorithm demonstrates its better performance. The experiment’s results indicate that the proposed VBICA algorithm is feasible, which has obvious advantages and a good application prospect. The reason is that it can effectively overcome the correlations between the various components in remote sensing images and break through the limitations of traditional remote sensing images analysis. Last but not least, the VBICA algorithm is applied in the classification of the TM multispectral remote sensing images. Compared to basic maximum likelihood classification, principal component analysis and FastICA algorithms, VBICA improves the classification accuracy of remote sensing images, and contributes to the further extension of the application of ICA in remote sensing image analysis.