Automatic detection of geological lineaments in central Turkey based on test image analysis using satellite data

Abstract

The Hamurcu and Başdere study areas, part of the Central Anatolian Volcanic Provence (CAVP), are associated with metalliferous ore deposits. The assumption that hydrothermal alterations might be related to faults and fractures makes mapping the lineaments around the study areas vital. Accordingly, geological lineaments in the vicinity of the studied areas in Central Anatolia (Turkey) were delineated using Landsat-8 and Phased Array type L-band Synthetic Aperture Radar (PALSAR) data. We adopted a new methodology for determining the optimal values of six parameters used in a fully automated extraction of lineaments. The lineaments identified in the region including the study areas strike mainly the NW-SE direction in the PALSAR data. Moreover, hydrothermal alterations around the towns of Hamurcu and Başdere are directly related to the NW-SE oriented faults, indicating that the lineations in the region might be carefully scrutinized in the exploration of mineralization zones. As a result, it was demonstrated in this study that the most appropriate parameter values specified for automatic lineament extraction successfully map geological structures around both study areas and can confidently be employed in different geographical locations.