FRACTAL-BASED MMW AND IR SYNTHETIC SCENE GENERATION

THE PROPOSED RESEARCH WILL INVESTIGATE EFFICIENT FRACTAL-BASED TECHNIQUES FOR GENERATING WIDE AREA SAR IMAGERY OF NATURAL CLUTTER TO SUPPORT WEAPONS SYSTEM TESTING. THE COMPUTER GRAPHICS FIELD HAS DEMONSTRATED THE USE OF FRACTALS FOR RAPIDLY CREATING VISUALLY REALISTIC BACKGROUND SCENES. FOR WEAPON SYSTEM TESTING, HOWEVER, SYNTHETIC DATA MUST ALSO PROVIDE A QUANTITATIVE REPRESENTATION OF THE SCENE -- PARTICULARLY THE CLUTTER STRUCTURE WHICH CAN IMPACT THE PERFORMANCE OF AUTOMATIC TARGET RECOGNITION AND DETECTION ALGORITHMS. TRADITIONAL FRACTAL-BASED TECHNIQUES CANNOT SUPPORT THIS REQUIREMENT IN SAR IMAGERY. ATLANTIC AEROSPACE PROPOSES TO OVERCOME LIMITATIONS OF COMMON FRACTAL TECHNIQUES FOR SAR SCENE GENERATION BY 1) USING HIGHER-ORDER FRACTALS AND 2) ANALYZING REAL DATA TO DETERMINE SYNTHESIS PARAMETERS. SEVERAL METHODS FOR EXTRACTING (LOW- AND HIGH-ORDER) FRACTAL DESCRIPTORS FROM REAL SAR IMAGERY AND GENERATING SYNTHETIC IMAGERY FROM THESE DESCRIPTORS WILL BE INVESTIGATED. A SYNTHETIC SCENE WILL BE GENERATED AND COMPARED TO REAL DATA FROM THE MIT/LL 35 GHZ ADTS SAR SYSTEM. SCENE FIDELITY WILL BE EVALUATED BY COMPARING MEASURED STATISTICAL AND POLARIMETRIC PROPERTIES, RELATING TO ATR ALGORITHM PERFORMANCE, BETWEEN THE REAL AND SYNTHETIC DATA. THE PHASE I EFFORT WILL RESULT IN CANDIDATE IMAGE-GENERATION TECHNIQUES AND SAMPLE SYNTHETIC IMAGERY DEMONSTRATING THESE TECHNIQUES. ANTICIPATED BENEFITS/POTENTIAL APPLICATIONS - THE PHASE I RESEARCH WILL VERIFY THE FEASIBILITY OF FRACTAL-BASED TECHNIQUES FOR SYNTHESIZING SAR BACKGROUND IMAGERY. SYNTHETIC IMAGES ARE USEFUL FOR DIGITAL AND HARDWARE-IN-THE-LOOP SIMULATIONS USED IN THE EVALUATION OF MMW AND IR WEAPON SYSTEMS. PHASE I WILL LAY THE GROUND WORK FOR FURTHER DEVELOPMENT AND EXTENSIVE EVALUATION IN PHASE II INCLUDING SYNTHESIS OF OTHER SENSOR IMAGERY AND THE DESIGN OF AN INTERACTIVE MULTI-SPECTRAL SCENE GENERATION WORKSTATION.