Jon Schoonmaker

Spectral detection and monitoring of marine mammals

This note presents an airborne spectral imaging system and methodology used to detect, track and monitor marine mammal populations. The system is a four band multispectral imaging system using spectral bands tailored for maritime imaging. This low cost, low volume, imaging sensor can be deployed on either a small unmanned air vehicle (UAV) or any other cost efficient aircraft. Results of recent multispectral data collects over marine mammals in St. Lawrence Seaway are presented. Species present included beluga whales as well as various species of larger baleen whales.

Airborne multispectral detecting system for marine mammals survey

This work presents an electro-optical multispectral capability that detects and monitors marine mammals. It is a continuance of Whale Search Radar SBIR program funded by PMA-264 through NAVAIR. A lightweight, multispectral, turreted imaging system is designed for airborne and ship based platforms to detect and monitor marine mammals. The system tests were conducted over the Humpback whale breeding and calving area in Maui, Hawaii. The results of the tests and the system description are presented. The development of an automatic whale detection algorithm is discussed as well as methodology used to turn raw survey data into quantifiable data products.

Band selection for viewing underwater objects using hyperspectral sensors

Multispectral and hyperspectral sensors are being used for remote sensing and imaging of ocean waters. Many applications require the compression of hyperspectral data to achieve real-time transmission or exploitation. Hyperspectral data compression or reduction has been accomplished using techniques based upon principal component analysis or linear unmixing. Alternatively, data compression (reduction) may be performed by band selection, or band selection may be preliminary to either of the other compression techniques. Band selection also has implications for sensor design and the stability of estimates of processing parameters. In this study, we address the question of which bands are the most efficacious for imaging submerged objects, such as whales, using an anomaly detector, or a matched filter. Bands are selected by optimizing a detection criterion subject to a constraint on the number of bands. The technique is applied to give hyperspectral data sets, and the optimum bandwidths and centers are determined. The loss in performance from selecting reduced numbers of bands is tabulated and the need for adaptively selecting reduced numbers of bands is demonstrated.

Measurements of beam spread in new sea ice

Measurements were made of the spread of a gaussian argon ion (489 nm) laser beam as it passed through up to 20 cm of sea ice grown in a water tank at air temperatures of -15, -25, and -35°C. These growth temperatures were selected to cover a range of ±10°C about the sea ice eutectic temperature of Teut = -21.2°C. The Beam Spread Function (BSF) and the transform related Modulation Transfer Function (MTF) were obtained for increasing thicknesses of ice grown at these temperatures. In general the BSF could be represented as the sum of a gaussian distribution of narrow width and large amplitude due to multiple narrow angle forward scattering and a smaller wider spread associated with a growing diffuse light field from multiple wider angle scattered light. For ice grown at all temperatures rms spread was found to follow a 3/2 power law with ice thickness. The rms spread was found to be less in the ice grown at the colder temperatures due to increased attenuation with the smaller ice crystal size.

The utility of automated Electro-Optical systems for measuring marine mammal densities

The objective of this work is to demonstrate an automated Electro-Optical and Infrared (EO/IR) system for measuring marine mammal densities. The ability of an EO/IR system to make density measurements without corresponding acoustic and visual data is only limited by the number of animals present and the probability that the animal is close enough to the surface to be detected and tracked. It is discussed the utility of this type of EO/IR system in measuring the densities of various species of interest.

Multispectral Observations of Marine Mammals

Multispectral visible and infrared observations of various species of whales were made in the St. Lawrence Seaway near Quebec, Canada and Papawai Point in Maui, Hawaii. The Multi-mission Adaptable Narrowband Imaging System (MANTIS) was deployed in two configurations: airborne looking down, and bluff mounted looking at low-grazing angles. An Infrared (IR) sensor was also deployed in the bluff mounted configuration. Detections of marine mammals were made with these systems of submerged mammals and surface mammals at ranges up to 8 miles. Automatic detection algorithms are being explored to detect, track and monitor the behavior of individuals and pods of whales. This effort is part of a United States Navy effort to insure that marine mammals are not injured during the testing of the US Navys acoustic Anti-submarine Warfare (ASW) systems.

Multichannel imager for littoral zone characterization

This paper describes an approach to utilize a multi-channel, multi-spectral electro-optic (EO) system for littoral zone characterization. Advanced Coherent Technologies, LLC (ACT) presents their EO sensor systems for the surf zone environmental assessment and potential surf zone target detection. Specifically, an approach is presented to determine a Surf Zone Index (SZI) from the multi-spectral EO sensor system. SZI provides a single quantitative value of the surf zone conditions delivering an immediate understanding of the area and an assessment as to how well an airborne optical system might perform in a mine countermeasures (MCM) operation. Utilizing consecutive frames of SZI images, ACT is able to measure variability over time. A surf zone nomograph, which incorporates targets, sensor, and environmental data, including the SZI to determine the environmental impact on system performance, is reviewed in this work. ACTs electro-optical multi-channel, multi-spectral imaging system and test results are presented and discussed.

A multispectral automatic target recognition application for maritime surveillance, search, and rescue

Due to increased security concerns, the commitment to monitor and maintain security in the maritime environment is increasingly a priority. A countrys coast is the most vulnerable area for the incursion of illegal immigrants, terrorists and contraband. This work illustrates the ability of a low-cost, light-weight, multi-spectral, multi-channel imaging system to handle the environment and see under difficult marine conditions. The system and its implemented detecting and tracking technologies should be organic to the maritime homeland security community for search and rescue, fisheries, defense, and law enforcement. It is tailored for airborne and ship based platforms to detect, track and monitor suspected objects (such as semi-submerged targets like marine mammals, vessels in distress, and drug smugglers). In this system, automated detection and tracking technology is used to detect, classify and localize potential threats or objects of interest within the imagery provided by the multi-spectral system. These algorithms process the sensor data in real time, thereby providing immediate feedback when features of interest have been detected. A supervised detection system based on Haar features and Cascade Classifiers is presented and results are provided on real data. The system is shown to be extendable and reusable for a variety of different applications.

Mission adaptable narrowband tunable imaging spectrometer (MANTIS): tactical spectral sensing

A series of low cost, light weight, mission-adaptable multispectral imaging spectrometers have been developed by PAR Government Systems Corporation (PGSC), utilizing mass-produced commercial off-the-shelf (COTS) components. The developed MANTIS sensors have been used to collect continuous multispectral data for mine counter measures (MCM) and intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance (ISR) applications aboard low cost manned aircraft platforms. Each MANTIS system images four spectral bands simultaneously. The four user-selectable spectral filters are inserted into an easily accessible filter cartridge supporting pre-flight filter selection. Data acquisition is accomplished by COTS frame grabbers installed in a Pentium based personal computer and all digitized data is written in real-time to a redundant array of independent disks (RAID). PGSC has also developed a graphical user interface providing control, display and recording options. The MANTIS approach and simple design lends itself to low-cost modifications and improvements.

Automated detection of marine animals using multispectral imaging

Personnel-based aerial surveys have demonstrated their capability for monitoring marine animal populations. That being said, not many studies have been conducted on smaller shark species in coastal waters, where they can become a threat to beach-goers and possibly be killed by beach protection netting. In this paper we report our findings on real-time, automated detection of great white shark dummy targets using a multispectral imager. 2.5 × 1.2 m plywood shark cutouts were submerged to 1 m, 2 m, and 3 m below the surface in the Pacific Ocean off the coast of San Diego, CA. 66 passes were conducted over the course of three days, resulting in an average probability of detection of 84.8%. Automatic detection was mostly limited by water turbidity in this test, but other environmental conditions such as wind, wave speed and period, and sun glint also had an effect on detection. The high probability of detection and low false alarm rate from this study are an indication that using an automated remote sensing system could be an effective alternative to personnel-based aerial surveys.