Outlier-Robust Superpixel-Level CFAR Detector With Truncated Clutter for Single Look Complex SAR Images

The constant false alarm rate (CFAR) detectors are well studied for ship detection in synthetic aperture radar (SAR) images, which suffer performance degradation due to the capture effect from interfering outliers, such as nearby targets, sidelobes, and ghosts in multitarget environments. To address...

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Main Authors: Tao Li, Dongliang Peng, Sainan Shi
Format: Article
Language:English
Published: IEEE 2022-01-01
Series:IEEE Journal of Selected Topics in Applied Earth Observations and Remote Sensing
Subjects:
Online Access:https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/9811355/
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author Tao Li
Dongliang Peng
Sainan Shi
author_facet Tao Li
Dongliang Peng
Sainan Shi
author_sort Tao Li
collection DOAJ
description The constant false alarm rate (CFAR) detectors are well studied for ship detection in synthetic aperture radar (SAR) images, which suffer performance degradation due to the capture effect from interfering outliers, such as nearby targets, sidelobes, and ghosts in multitarget environments. To address this issue, the clutter truncation scheme is adopted to reduce the outlier contamination in clutter samples such that the accuracy of clutter modeling can be improved. However, the selection of clutter truncation depth is difficult, which often resorts to sensitivity study. In this article, the complex signal kurtosis (CSK) is first utilized as a statistical indicator for the decision of truncation depth to guarantee that the true clutter samples are maintained. Besides, a coarse-to-fine detection process is designed, including global superpixel proposal with the CSK and local identification of target pixels with the superpixel-level CFAR detector based on truncated statistics. During the local CFAR detection stage, the segmented superpixels provide convenient sample indexing for the iterative clutter truncation processing. The elevated performance achieved by the proposed method mainly benefits from the schemes of two-stage detection and automatic clutter truncation, yielding the increased detection efficiency and accuracy at the same time. Besides, false alarms caused by radio frequency interference can be reduced. In the experiment, the comparative results with state-of-the-art methods based on the Sentinel-1 and Gaofen-3 SAR data validate the performance of the proposed method.
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spelling doaj.art-2c5901b6283241f1afdaf2aefcb9ac4b2022-12-22T03:39:09ZengIEEEIEEE Journal of Selected Topics in Applied Earth Observations and Remote Sensing2151-15352022-01-01155261527410.1109/JSTARS.2022.31875169811355Outlier-Robust Superpixel-Level CFAR Detector With Truncated Clutter for Single Look Complex SAR ImagesTao Li0https://orcid.org/0000-0001-6782-5689Dongliang Peng1https://orcid.org/0000-0002-5549-2511Sainan Shi2School of Automation, Hangzhou Dianzi University, Hangzhou, ChinaSchool of Automation, Hangzhou Dianzi University, Hangzhou, ChinaSchool of Electronic and Information Engineering, Nanjing University of Information Science and Technology, Nanjing, ChinaThe constant false alarm rate (CFAR) detectors are well studied for ship detection in synthetic aperture radar (SAR) images, which suffer performance degradation due to the capture effect from interfering outliers, such as nearby targets, sidelobes, and ghosts in multitarget environments. To address this issue, the clutter truncation scheme is adopted to reduce the outlier contamination in clutter samples such that the accuracy of clutter modeling can be improved. However, the selection of clutter truncation depth is difficult, which often resorts to sensitivity study. In this article, the complex signal kurtosis (CSK) is first utilized as a statistical indicator for the decision of truncation depth to guarantee that the true clutter samples are maintained. Besides, a coarse-to-fine detection process is designed, including global superpixel proposal with the CSK and local identification of target pixels with the superpixel-level CFAR detector based on truncated statistics. During the local CFAR detection stage, the segmented superpixels provide convenient sample indexing for the iterative clutter truncation processing. The elevated performance achieved by the proposed method mainly benefits from the schemes of two-stage detection and automatic clutter truncation, yielding the increased detection efficiency and accuracy at the same time. Besides, false alarms caused by radio frequency interference can be reduced. In the experiment, the comparative results with state-of-the-art methods based on the Sentinel-1 and Gaofen-3 SAR data validate the performance of the proposed method.https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/9811355/Ship detectionsuperpixelsynthetic aperture radar (SAR)truncated statistics
spellingShingle Tao Li
Dongliang Peng
Sainan Shi
Outlier-Robust Superpixel-Level CFAR Detector With Truncated Clutter for Single Look Complex SAR Images
IEEE Journal of Selected Topics in Applied Earth Observations and Remote Sensing
Ship detection
superpixel
synthetic aperture radar (SAR)
truncated statistics
title Outlier-Robust Superpixel-Level CFAR Detector With Truncated Clutter for Single Look Complex SAR Images
title_full Outlier-Robust Superpixel-Level CFAR Detector With Truncated Clutter for Single Look Complex SAR Images
title_fullStr Outlier-Robust Superpixel-Level CFAR Detector With Truncated Clutter for Single Look Complex SAR Images
title_full_unstemmed Outlier-Robust Superpixel-Level CFAR Detector With Truncated Clutter for Single Look Complex SAR Images
title_short Outlier-Robust Superpixel-Level CFAR Detector With Truncated Clutter for Single Look Complex SAR Images
title_sort outlier robust superpixel level cfar detector with truncated clutter for single look complex sar images
topic Ship detection
superpixel
synthetic aperture radar (SAR)
truncated statistics
url https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/9811355/
work_keys_str_mv AT taoli outlierrobustsuperpixellevelcfardetectorwithtruncatedclutterforsinglelookcomplexsarimages
AT dongliangpeng outlierrobustsuperpixellevelcfardetectorwithtruncatedclutterforsinglelookcomplexsarimages
AT sainanshi outlierrobustsuperpixellevelcfardetectorwithtruncatedclutterforsinglelookcomplexsarimages