TecLines: A MATLAB-based toolbox for tectonic lineament analysis from satellite images and DEMs, part 2: Line segments linking and merging

Abstract

Extraction and interpretation of tectonic lineaments is one of the routines for mapping large areas using remote sensing data. However, this is a subjective and time-consuming process. It is difficult to choose an optimal lineament extraction method in order to reduce subjectivity and obtain vectors similar to what an analyst would manually extract. The objective of this study is the implementation, evaluation and comparison of Hough transform, segment merging and polynomial fitting methods towards automated tectonic lineament mapping. For this purpose we developed a new MATLAB-based toolbox (TecLines). The proposed toolbox capabilities were validated using a synthetic Digital Elevation Model (DEM) and tested along in the Andarab fault zone (Afghanistan) where specific fault structures are known. In this study, we used filters in both frequency and spatial domains and the tensor voting framework to produce binary edge maps. We used the Hough transform to extract linear image discontinuities. We used B-spline as a polynomial curve fitting method to eliminate artificial line segments that are out of interest and to link discontinuous segments with similar trends. We performed statistical analyses in order to compare the final image discontinuities maps with existing references map.