Chapter 10
Fusion of Images from Heterogeneous
Sensors
10.1 Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 223
10.2 Fusion of Thermal and Optical Data . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 224
10.2.1 Background and Literature Review . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 225
10.2.2 Fusion of ASTER Data . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 226
10.2.2.1 ASTER imaging sensor . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 227
10.2.2.2 A Fusion scheme for TIR ASTER data . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 227
10.2.2.3 Interchannel correlation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 228
10.2.2.4 Results and discussion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 230
10.3 Fusion of Optical and SAR Data . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 233
10.3.1 Problem Statement . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 234
10.3.2 Literature Review . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 235
10.3.3 Quality Issues . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 236
10.3.4 Fusion of Landsat 7 ETM+ and ERS SAR Data . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 237
10.3.4.1 Fusion scheme . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 237
10.3.4.2 Generalized intensity mo dulation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 239
10.3.4.3 Simulation results . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 240
10.3.4.4 Summary and discussion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 244
10.4 Concluding Remarks . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 245
10.1 Introduction
The term heterogeneous sensors indicates instruments that do not exploit
overlapped wavelength intervals and/or same imaging mechanisms to produce
observations. Fusion of images acquired by heterogeneous sensors is gaining an
ever increasing relevance in application fields where, notwithstanding techno-
logical progresses and developments, intrinsic limitations of imaging sensors
cannot offer substantial benefits in a unique dataset.
This scenario also occurs in the remote sensing field because of the hetero-
geneous nature of sensors that are currently employed for a variety of appli-
cations, as discussed in Chapter 2, where remote sensing principles were in-
troduced and basic concepts on sensors were presented. In particular, passive
and active sensors exist that operate in a wide range of spectral wavelengths.
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