Evaluation of Edge Detection Techniques towards Implementation of Automatic Target Recognition

The vision of Automatic Target Recognition (ATR) is through an integrated command identification architecture that combines non-cooperative and cooperative identification sensors and systems. The ATR implemented shall support development of situational awareness i.e., overall, general knowledge of the tactical battlefield environment, including the location of friendly, neutral, and enemy forces and plan of action for battle. The required operational capability will then be achieved by combining onboard data from multiple sensors and systems with indirectly supplied off board information. Edge Detection is one of the major image-processing requirements for achieving efficient and accurate target recognition in difficult domains. The on-board sensors used on combat aircraft are Electro-optic Targeting Sensors (EOTS), Infra-red (IR) sensors, Radar, Synthetic Aperture Radar (SAR) and Inverse SAR (ISAR) providing vast amount of images with different characteristics helpful for detecting targets. This paper concentrates on the assessment of advanced edge detection techniques on all types of sensor input images obtained for the implementation of automatic target recognition for air-to-air, air-to-sea and air-to-ground applications. This paper also describes the approach towards implementation of automatic target recognition for the entire range of sensor inputs. The proposed algorithm for automatic target recognition is for implementation on airborne systems with potential use on ground stations.