Fuzzy partitioning using a real-coded variable-length genetic algorithm for pixel classification

The problem of classifying an image into different homogeneous regions is viewed as the task of clustering the pixels in the intensity space. Real-coded variable string length genetic fuzzy clustering with automatic evolution of clusters is used for this purpose. The cluster centers are encoded in the chromosomes, and the Xie-Beni index is used as a measure of the validity of the corresponding partition. The effectiveness of the proposed technique is demonstrated for classifying different landcover regions in remote sensing imagery. Results are compared with those obtained using the well-known fuzzy C-means algorithm.