Real-time on-orbit image quality improvement for a wide-field imaging system with detector arrays

Abstract

Wide-field imaging systems are faced with the problem of massive image information processing and transmission. Due to the limitation of data bandwidth and other factors, it is difficult for the current technology to process and transmit massive images in real-time. With the requirement for fast response, the demand for real-time on-orbit image processing is increasing. In practice, nonuniformity correction is an important preprocessing step to improve the quality of surveillance images. This paper presents a new real-time on-orbit nonuniform background correction method, which only uses the local pixels of a single row output in real-time, breaking the dependence of the traditional algorithm on the whole image information. Combined with the FPGA pipeline design, when the local pixels of a single row are read out, the processing is completed, and no cache is required at all, which saves the resource overhead in hardware design. It achieves microsecond-level ultra-low latency. The experimental results show that under the influence of strong stray light and strong dark current, our real-time algorithm has a better image quality improvement effect compared with the traditional algorithm. It will greatly help the on-orbit real-time moving target recognition and tracking.