RECOGNITION AND DETECTION OF IMPACT CRATERS FROM EO PRODUCTS

摘要

Impact craters represent a novel and fundamental fieldrnof research in Solar System studies. The quest for Earthrnimpact craters entails the exploitation of EarthrnObservation products and of their processing for thernidentification of crater features, their detection andrnpossible recognition. In the past decades, impacts byrnextraterrestrial bodies were regarded as an interestingrnbut certainly not important phenomenon in the spectrumrnof geological processes affecting the dynamic evolutionrnof the Earth. On the contrary, at the present, thernattention devoted to this phenomenon is significantlyrnincreased, thanks to the important role played byrnplanetary exploration. According to planetary scientistsrn[1], impact cratering was a dominant geological processrnduring the growth of the planetary bodies of the SolarrnSystem. The emerging of this kind of view of planets asrngeological objects, places the search for unknownrnimpact craters as a basic element for the study of thernevolution of the planets, and in particular of the Earth.rnIn this context, this paper addresses the issue ofrnrecognition and detection of impact craters on the Earthrnby using Earth Observation products (I.e. remoternsensing images). In particular, approaches based on thernHough Transform and on the Radial Consistencyrnmeasure are considered and compared. In addition,rnnovel techniques (based on the use of the K-meansrnalgorithm and of stochastic processes) for the reductionrnof the computational load associated with thernconsidered approaches are described. Preliminaryrnexperimental results are reported that point outrnadvantages and disadvantages of the consideredrnmethods.