Figure-ground separation by a neural dynamical system

This paper describes a neural network inspired dynamical system approach to a perceptual grouping problem-figure-ground separation. In this approach, a non-linear differential equation is defined at each pixel site and coupled with those at its neighbours. The steady state solution would determine whether a pixel is part of a salient structure or background/noise. The neighbourhood couplings are used to achieve spatial interactions that are essential to perceptual grouping, such as excitation and inhibition. Experimental results on the grouping of dots in synthetic and real-world images demonstrate the efficacy of the proposed approach.