A despeckle filter for the Cassini synthetic aperture radar images of Titan's surface

Cassini synthetic aperture radar (SAR) images of Titan, the largest satellite of Saturn, reveal surface features with shapes ranging from quasi-circular to more complex ones, interpreted as liquid hydrocarbon deposits assembled in the form of lakes or seas. One of the major problems hampering the derivation of meaningful texture information from SAR imagery is the speckle noise. It overlays real structures and causes gray value variations even in homogeneous parts of the image. We propose a filtering technique which can be applied to obtain restored SAR images. Our technique is based on probabilistic methods and regards an image as a random element drawn from a prespecified set of possible images. The despeckle filter can be used as an intermediate step for the extraction of regions of interest, corresponding to structured units in a given area or distinct objects of interest, such as lake-like features on Titan. This tool can therefore be used, among other, to study seasonal surficial changes of Titan's polar regions. In this study we also present a segmentation technique that allows us to separate the lakes from the local background. (C) 2011 Published by Elsevier Ltd.