SAR data fusion and a novel joint use of neural networks for coastline extraction

In this paper, a novel automated coastline extraction method from SAR (Synthetic Aperture Radar) data is presented. The method is designed to exploit radar backscatter coefficients ((Formula presented.)) from multipolarization SAR acquisitions (the 4 classic co- and cross-polarized polarizations), whereas single-pol data are employed in the majority of methods in this field, implementing data fusion through the use of an autoencoder neural network and producing the coastline by harnessing a Pulse-Coupled Neural Network (PCNN). Main results are presented throughout the paper, demonstrating superiority and comparability with established methods and with a recent automated algorithm that can be considered among the state-of-the art techniques in this field; furthermore, effectiveness of data fusion and segmentation obtained through the mentioned neural networks has been compared to that of several combinations of the same networks with different frameworks: a different data fusion framework, obtained through the use of linear Principal Component Analysis (PCA), and a different binarization framework, based on the use of Expectation-Maximization (EM) image segmentation. Main achievements of presented technique consist in enabling a possible faster processing as well as the opportunity of operating with an improved fused information content on coastline, together with very high accuracy results