Polarimetric target detection in the presence of spatially fluctuating Mueller matrices

In polarimetric imaging systems, the main source of perturbations may not be detection noise but fluctuations of the Mueller matrices in the scene. In this case, we propose a method for determining the illumination and analysis polarization states that allow reaching the highest target detection performance. We show with simulations and real-world images that, in practical applications, the statistics of Mueller matrix fluctuations have to be taken into account to optimize polarimetric imagery. (C) 2011 Optical Society of America