Data fusion experience: from industrial visual inspection to space remote-sensing applications

Successful development of space research demand a synergistic effort of the two main agents involved in it: academic and industrial communities. The importance of the collaboration between both sectors is out of discussion. However, it is necessary to foster and emphasize new and more efficient strategies of cooperation in order to face efficiently the challenges of the new century. This paper represents a case study on successful collaboration and mutual benefit between scientific community and industry. In particular, the transfer of data-fusion techniques to industrial visual inspection problems is analyzed. This example of collaboration between industry and academic community in the context of data fusion for industrial visual inspection can be extended to the application of remote-sensing data fusion techniques to space research. In the paper, analogies between both cases are analyzed.