On the role of spectral resolution and classifier complexity in the analysis of hyperspectral images of forest areas

Remote sensing hyperspectral sensors are important and powerful instruments for addressing land-cover classification problems, as they permit a detailed characterization of the spectral behavior of the considered information classes. However, the processing of hyperspectral data is particularly complex both from the theoretical viewpoint (e.g. problems related to the Hughes phenomenon [1]) and from the computational perspective. In this context, despite many investigations have been presented in the literature on feature reduction and feature extraction in hyperspectral data, only few studies analyzed the role of the spectral resolution on the classification accuracy in different application domains. In this paper, we present an empirical study aimed at understanding the relationships among spectral resolution, classifier complexity, and classification accuracy obtained with hyperspectral sensors in classification of forest areas. On the basis of this study, important conclusions can b...