LINE AND BOUNDARY DETECTION IN SPECKLE IMAGES

This paper considers the problem of detecting lines in speckle imagery , such as that produced by synthetic aperture radar (SAR) or ultrasoun d techniques. Using the physical principles that account for the speck le phenomenon, we derive the optimal detector for lines in fully devel oped speckle, and we compare the optimal detector to several suboptima l detection rules that are more computationally efficient. We show tha t when the noise is uncorrelated, a very simple suboptimal detection r ule is nearly optimal, and that even in colored speckle, a related cla ss of detectors can approach optimal performance. Finally, we also dis cuss the application of this technique to medical ultrasonic images, w here the detection of tissue boundaries is considered as a problem of line detection.