Short-wave infrared signature and detection of aicraft in flight based on space-borne hyperspectral imagery

Abstract

Infrared signatures of aircraft are the basis for detection and monitoring. In past years, most of the studies focused on the aircraft’s infrared signature in the mid-wave spectral region and long-wave spectral region for missile guidance or aircraft survivability studies. For the security of civil aviation, methods and instruments that can detect and monitor aircrafts from space are expected to be developed in the coming years. A short-wave infrared hyperspectral imager aboard the Tiangong-1 spacecraft acquired some civil aircraft’s spectral data. The differences between the aircraft and the background in their spectral signatures are analyzed and discussed. Less absorption in the vapor absorption bands and a reflection spike is discovered at the 1.84 μm spectral band. The result shows that 1.84 μm and other vapor absorption bands can make contributions to aircraft detection in the daytime.