Synthetic aperture radar image segmentation with quantum annealing

Abstract

In image processing, image segmentation is the process of partitioning a digital image into multiple image segments. Among state-of-the-art methods, Markov random fields can be used to model dependencies between pixels and achieve a segmentation by minimising an associated cost function. Currently, finding the optimal set of segments for a given image modelled as a Markov random fields appears to be NP-hard. The authors aim to take advantage of the exponential scalability of quantum computing to speed up the segmentation of synthetic aperture radar images. For that purpose, the authors propose a hybrid quantum annealing classical optimisation expectation maximisation algorithm to obtain optimal sets of segments. After proposing suitable formulations, the authors discuss the performances and the scalability of authors’ approach on the D-Wave quantum computer. The authors also propose a short study of optimal computation parameters to enlighten the limits and potential of the adiabatic quantum computation to solve large instances of combinatorial optimisation problems.