Self-organizing map application for retrieval of man-made structures in remote sensing data

Self-Organizing Maps (SOMs) have been successfully applied to content-based image retrieval (CBIR). In this study, we investigate the potential of PicSOM, an image database browsing system, applied to remote sensing images. Databases of small images were artificially created, either from a single satellite image for object detection, or two satellite images when considering change detection. By visually querying those databases, it was possible to detect targets like houses, roads or man-made structures, as well as changes between two QuickBird images. Preliminary results were encouraging, and open a full range of applications, from structure detection to change detection, to be embedded in a same operative system.