A multiresolution approach to target detection in synthetic aperture radar data

We demonstrate the utility of a multiresolution approach for target detection in SAR imagery. In particular, man-made objects exhibit characteristic phase and amplitude fluctuations as the image resolution is varied, while natural terrain (i.e. clutter) has a random signature. We show that the multiresolution clutter process decomposes into a Brownian motion process in resolution. We then construct an optimal invariant multiresolution detector based on a derived multiresolution increments process and show that it significantly outperforms a standard energy detector operating on the finest available SAR resolution