MDCNet: A Multi-Neighborhood Dense Connectivity Network for Infrared Transmission Line Clamp Segmentation

Advancements in infrared imaging technology have introduced a novel perspective for inspecting power transmission lines. Nevertheless, the inherent low contrast and indistinct edges of infrared images present significant challenges, rendering the direct application of traditional semantic segmentation algorithms unsatisfactory. To mitigate this problem, we propose a multi-neighborhood densely connected network architecture. This framework incorporates two pivotal modules: the Multi-Head Squeeze-and-Excitation (MHSE) module and the Multi-Neighborhood Feature Fusion (MNFF) module. The MHSE enhances local feature representations by capturing nuanced feature interactions, thereby alleviating the issue of imbalanced global feature weight distribution. The MNFF aggregates feature data from multiple adjacent nodes at each node’s input, which not only facilitates the integration of multi-scale target features but also leverages neighborhood information to precisely localize and amplify features within specific regions. Furthermore, we have built the first Infrared Dataset of Power Transmission Line Suspension Clamp (CLAMPTISS) to substantiate our approach. Empirical evidence demonstrates that our proposed network surpasses state-of-the-art networks across three key metrics: the mean Intersection over Union (mIoU) and localization accuracy (Pd) have increased by 8.3% and 13.3%, respectively, while the false alarm rate (Fa) has decreased by 38.2%.