RII Track-4:@NASA: Enhancing Flood Detection and Mapping by Using PolSAR, Metaheuristic, and Deep Learning Algorithms

洪水是最致命的灾害之一，也是世界范围内对生命、财产、经济和环境最常见和最频繁的自然灾害。迫切需要准确和快速地绘制洪水地区的地图，以改进对洪水的反应和从洪水中恢复、水资源管理、有效的土地管理和减轻风险的努力。鉴于极端天气事件更加频繁，对洪水地区的探测应迅速加快灾害响应，并最大限度地提高减灾工作的成功率。目前，利用高分辨率合成孔径雷达（SAR）数据对洪涝地区进行准确、快速的制图还存在一定的知识缺口。这项研究基础设施改善轨道4 EPSCoR研究人员（RII轨道4）项目将为夏威夷大学的副教授提供奖学金，并为博士后提供培训。这项工作将与美国宇航局马歇尔太空飞行中心（MSFC）的研究人员合作进行。该研究项目为利用高分辨率SAR数据精确、快速地探测洪水地区提供了最先进的框架。这项研究的结果将有利于不同的利益相关者群体，包括水文学家、政府机构和承包商、保险提供商、土地开发商、社区规划者和生活在洪水易发地区的个人。这些教育活动旨在激励代表性不足的高中生和本科生攻读科学、技术、工程和数学（STEM）领域的高级学位，并改善研究生的教育。将制作和传播录像，以扩大公众对这项奖学金对服务不足的美国太平洋岛民的好处的认识和赞赏。该奖学金的主要目标是通过追求四个具体目标来改变首席研究员（PI）的研究轨迹，并使其所在的机构和司法管辖区受益：1)与NASA马歇尔太空飞行中心的东道国建立牢固的伙伴关系：PI将对东道国进行四次合作访问，以推进他的项目，并与东道国建立长期合作关系。主持人还将两次访问项目负责人所在机构，共同指导博士后研究员，并为利益相关者举办研讨会；2)通过开发和验证最先进的计算工具，提高基于SAR的洪水制图知识：PI和博士后研究员将处理与四个洪水事件相关的SAR图像，通过元启发式算法找到其最佳极化SAR （PolSAR）分解，并使用深度残差U-Net模型检测洪水区域；3)促进在水文、遥感和自然灾害领域对教育不足的学生的教育：PI还将让教育不足的学生参与与该奖学金相关的研究活动，以提高他们的批判性思维能力。预期的结果是培养下一代科学家在水文和自然灾害中使用科学计算工具，并缩小少数民族学生在地球科学方面的劳动力差距，以及4)在洪水期间制定有效的灾害响应策略。协调一个由利益攸关方组成的工作组，制定协议，使地方和州应急管理人员可以使用该奖学金的洪水地图，以减轻洪水对居住在沿海社区的代表性不足的人口的影响。该奖项反映了美国国家科学基金会的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的知识价值和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

Floods are among the deadliest disasters and the most common and frequent natural hazards to life, property, the economy, and the environment worldwide. There is a vital need for an accurate and quick mapping of flooded areas to improve response to and recovery from floods, water resources management, effective land management, and risk mitigation efforts. Given the more frequent extreme weather events, detection of flooded areas should be quick to expedite the disaster response and maximize the success of mitigation efforts. Currently, there is a knowledge gap in the accurate and fast mapping of flooded areas with high-resolution synthetic aperture radar (SAR) data. This Research Infrastructure Improvement Track-4 EPSCoR Research Fellows (RII Track-4) project will provide a fellowship to an Associate Professor and training for a postdoctoral fellow at the University of Hawaii. This work will be conducted in collaboration with researchers at NASA Marshall Space Flight Center (MSFC). This fellowship provides a state-of-the-art framework for the precise and rapid detection of flooded areas with high-resolution SAR data. The results from this fellowship will be beneficial for a diverse group of stakeholders, including hydrologists, government agencies and contractors, insurance providers, land developers, community planners, and individuals living in flood-prone areas. The educational activities are designed to motivate underrepresented high school and undergraduate students to pursue advanced degrees in Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics (STEM) fields and improve graduate students’ education. Videos will be created and disseminated to broaden public awareness and appreciation of the benefits of this fellowship for underserved U.S. Pacific Islanders.The main goal of this fellowship is to transform the Principal Investigator (PI)’s research trajectory and benefit his home institution and jurisdiction by pursuing four specific objectives: 1) Building a strong partnership with his host at the NASA Marshall Space Flight Center: The PI will make four collaborative visits to the host site to advance his project and create a long-term collaborative relationship with the host. The host will also visit the PI’s institution twice to co-advise the postdoctoral researcher and present a seminar for stakeholders; 2) Advancing the knowledge of SAR-based flood mapping by developing and validating state-of-the-art computational tools: The PI and postdoctoral researcher will process SAR images related to four flood events, find their optimum polarimetric SAR (PolSAR) decompositions via metaheuristic algorithms, and use the deep Residual U-Net model to detect flooded areas; 3) Promoting education of underserved students in the field of hydrology, remote sensing, and natural hazards: The PI will also engage underserved students in research activities related to this fellowship to enhance their critical thinking skills. The expected outcomes are to prepare the next generation of scientists to use scientific computing tools in hydrology and natural hazards, and close the workforce gap for minority students in geoscience, and 4) Creating effective disaster response strategies during a flood: Coordinating a working group of stakeholders to create protocols by which the flood maps from this fellowship can be used by local and state emergency managers to mitigate the impacts of floods on underrepresented populations living in coastal communities.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.