Land Use/Cover Mapping with Quad-polarization Radar and Derived Texture Measures near Wad Madani, Sudan

Abstract

This study examines the relative utility of quad-polarization spaceborne radar and derived texture measures for classification of specific land cover categories at a site in east-central Sudan near the city of Wad Madani. Japanese Advanced Land Observing Satellite (ALOS) Phased Array type L-band Synthetic Aperture Radar (PALSAR) quad-polarization spaceborne radar data at 12.5 m spatial resolution were obtained for this study. Measures of variance texture were applied to the original PALSAR data over varied window sizes. Transformed divergence (TD) measures of separability were calculated in order to evaluate the best bands from the original and texture measures for classification. Results show that quad-polarization radar data and derived texture measures have high separability between different land cover classes, and therefore hold potential to attain high levels of classification accuracy. Specifically, when used individually the cross-polarization bands showed the highest separability, but when used in combination some mix of cross- and like-polarization bands had the highest separability.