Generalization of spectral fidelity with flexible measures for the sparse representation classification of hyperspectral images

- We proposed a generalized sparse representation classification framework to accomodate flexible spectral similar measures.
- A solution to the general SRC framework is developed by the use of gradient descent algorithm.
- The proposed model outperforms the state-of-the-art methods.

Sparse representation classification (SRC) is becoming a promising tool for hyperspectral image (HSI) classification, where the Euclidean spectral distance (ESD) is widely used to reflect the fidelity between the original and reconstructed signals. In this paper, a generalized model is proposed to extend SRC by characterizing the spectral fidelity with flexible similarity measures. To validate the flexibility, several typical similarity measures-the spectral angle similarity (SAS), spectral information divergence (SID), the structural similarity index measure (SSIM), and the ESD-are included in the generalized model. Furthermore, a general solution based on a gradient descent technique is used to solve the nonlinear optimization problem formulated by the flexible similarity measures. To test the generalized model, two actual HSIs were used, and the experimental results confirm the ability of the proposed model to accommodate the various spectral similarity measures. Performance comparisons with the ESD, SAS, SID, and SSIM criteria were also conducted, and the results consistently show the advantages of the generalized model for HSI classification in terms of overall accuracy and kappa coefficient.