Advances and Challenges in Multimodal Remote Sensing Image Registration

Over the past few decades, with the rapid development of global aerospace and aerial remote sensing technology, the types of sensors have evolved from the traditional monomodal sensors (e.g., optical sensors) to the new generation of multimodal sensors (e.g., multispectral, hyperspectral, light detection and ranging (LiDAR), and synthetic aperture radar (SAR) sensors). These advanced devices can dynamically provide various and abundant multimodal remote sensing images (MRSIs) with different spatial, temporal, and spectral resolutions according to different application requirements. Since then, it is of great scientific significance to carry out the research of MRSI registration, which is a crucial step for integrating the complementary information among multimodal data and making comprehensive observations and analysis of the Earth’s surface. In this work, we will present our own contributions to the field of multimodal image registration, summarize the advantages and limitations of existing multimodal image registration methods, and then discuss the remaining challenges and make a forward-looking prospect for the future development of the field.