Marine target detection using dual-polarimetric SAR imagery

In this study, we provide a summary of research advances in the field of maritime target detection using DP (dual-polarimetric) SAR (Synthetic Aperture Radar) imagery, accomplished during the European and China collaboration in the framework of the Dragon-4 program ID 32235. The main innovative contribution is twofold: ①We addressed ship detection proposing an improved GP-PNF (Geometrical Perturbation-Polarimetric Notch Filter), termed as IGP-PNF, that is characterized by a new feature vector that includes three new scattering features; ②We addressed oil platform detection by contrasting single-polarization SAR methods with polarimetric ones in order to quantify the extra- benefit carried on polarimetric information. The proposed theoretical framework is tested against actual multi-polarization SAR data. In particular, ship detection methods are verified against a Sentinel-1 SAR scene where a large number of ships is present; while, oil platform detection is discussed using TerraSAR-X SAR data. Experimental analysis shows that: ①The IGP-PNF method performs best in terms of clutter-to-target ratio; ②Coherent polarimetric information significantly outperforms single-polarization SAR measurements in highlighting targets in challenging cases.