MFCEN: A lightweight multi-scale feature cooperative enhancement network for single-image super-resolution

In recent years, significant progress has been made in single-image super-resolution with the advancements of deep convolutional neural networks (CNNs) and transformer-based architectures. These two techniques have led the way in the field of super-resolution technology research. However, performanc...

Full description

Saved in:
Bibliographic Details
Main Authors: Jiange Liu, Yu Chen, Xin Dai, Li Cao, Qingwu Li
Format: Article
Language:English
Published: AIMS Press 2024-10-01
Series:Electronic Research Archive
Subjects:
Online Access:https://www.aimspress.com/article/doi/10.3934/era.2024267
Tags: Add Tag
No Tags, Be the first to tag this record!
_version_ 1832590774510813184
author Jiange Liu
Yu Chen
Xin Dai
Li Cao
Qingwu Li
author_facet Jiange Liu
Yu Chen
Xin Dai
Li Cao
Qingwu Li
author_sort Jiange Liu
collection DOAJ
description In recent years, significant progress has been made in single-image super-resolution with the advancements of deep convolutional neural networks (CNNs) and transformer-based architectures. These two techniques have led the way in the field of super-resolution technology research. However, performance improvements often come at the cost of a substantial increase in the number of parameters, thereby limiting the practical applications of super-resolution methods. Existing lightweight super-resolution methods, which primarily focus on single-scale feature extraction, lead to the issue of missing multi-scale features. This results in incomplete feature acquisition and poor reconstruction of the image. In response to these challenges, this paper proposed a lightweight multi-scale feature cooperative enhancement network (MFCEN). The network consists of three parts: shallow feature extraction, deep feature extraction, and image reconstruction. In the deep feature extraction part, a novel integrated multi-level feature module was introduced. Compared to existing CNN and transformer hybrid super-resolution networks, MFCEN significantly reduced the number of parameters while maintaining performance. This improvement was particularly evident at a scale factor of 3. The network introduced a novel comprehensive integrated multi-level feature module, leveraging the strong local perceptual capabilities of CNNs and the superior global information processing of transformers. It was designed with depthwise separable convolutions for extracting local information and a block-scale and global feature extraction module based on vision transformers (ViTs). While extracting the three scales of features, a satisfiability attention mechanism with a feed-forward network that can control the information was used to keep the network lightweight. Experiments demonstrated that the proposed model surpasses the reconstruction performance of the 498K-parameter SPAN model with a mere 488K parameters. Extensive experiments on commonly used image super-resolution datasets further validated the effectiveness of the network.
format Article
id doaj-art-cd4de45b22ac481abdbac5aa21834ace
institution Kabale University
issn 2688-1594
language English
publishDate 2024-10-01
publisher AIMS Press
record_format Article
series Electronic Research Archive
spelling doaj-art-cd4de45b22ac481abdbac5aa21834ace2025-01-23T07:52:53ZengAIMS PressElectronic Research Archive2688-15942024-10-0132105783580310.3934/era.2024267MFCEN: A lightweight multi-scale feature cooperative enhancement network for single-image super-resolutionJiange Liu0Yu Chen1Xin Dai2Li Cao3Qingwu Li4State Grid Huaian Power Supply Company, Jiangsu 223001, ChinaCollege of Information Science and Engineering, Hohai University, Jiangsu 213200, ChinaState Grid Huaian Power Supply Company, Jiangsu 223001, ChinaState Grid Huaian Power Supply Company, Jiangsu 223001, ChinaCollege of Information Science and Engineering, Hohai University, Jiangsu 213200, ChinaIn recent years, significant progress has been made in single-image super-resolution with the advancements of deep convolutional neural networks (CNNs) and transformer-based architectures. These two techniques have led the way in the field of super-resolution technology research. However, performance improvements often come at the cost of a substantial increase in the number of parameters, thereby limiting the practical applications of super-resolution methods. Existing lightweight super-resolution methods, which primarily focus on single-scale feature extraction, lead to the issue of missing multi-scale features. This results in incomplete feature acquisition and poor reconstruction of the image. In response to these challenges, this paper proposed a lightweight multi-scale feature cooperative enhancement network (MFCEN). The network consists of three parts: shallow feature extraction, deep feature extraction, and image reconstruction. In the deep feature extraction part, a novel integrated multi-level feature module was introduced. Compared to existing CNN and transformer hybrid super-resolution networks, MFCEN significantly reduced the number of parameters while maintaining performance. This improvement was particularly evident at a scale factor of 3. The network introduced a novel comprehensive integrated multi-level feature module, leveraging the strong local perceptual capabilities of CNNs and the superior global information processing of transformers. It was designed with depthwise separable convolutions for extracting local information and a block-scale and global feature extraction module based on vision transformers (ViTs). While extracting the three scales of features, a satisfiability attention mechanism with a feed-forward network that can control the information was used to keep the network lightweight. Experiments demonstrated that the proposed model surpasses the reconstruction performance of the 498K-parameter SPAN model with a mere 488K parameters. Extensive experiments on commonly used image super-resolution datasets further validated the effectiveness of the network.https://www.aimspress.com/article/doi/10.3934/era.2024267single-image super-resolutionlightweightmulti-scaleattention mechanism
spellingShingle Jiange Liu
Yu Chen
Xin Dai
Li Cao
Qingwu Li
MFCEN: A lightweight multi-scale feature cooperative enhancement network for single-image super-resolution
Electronic Research Archive
single-image super-resolution
lightweight
multi-scale
attention mechanism
title MFCEN: A lightweight multi-scale feature cooperative enhancement network for single-image super-resolution
title_full MFCEN: A lightweight multi-scale feature cooperative enhancement network for single-image super-resolution
title_fullStr MFCEN: A lightweight multi-scale feature cooperative enhancement network for single-image super-resolution
title_full_unstemmed MFCEN: A lightweight multi-scale feature cooperative enhancement network for single-image super-resolution
title_short MFCEN: A lightweight multi-scale feature cooperative enhancement network for single-image super-resolution
title_sort mfcen a lightweight multi scale feature cooperative enhancement network for single image super resolution
topic single-image super-resolution
lightweight
multi-scale
attention mechanism
url https://www.aimspress.com/article/doi/10.3934/era.2024267
work_keys_str_mv AT jiangeliu mfcenalightweightmultiscalefeaturecooperativeenhancementnetworkforsingleimagesuperresolution
AT yuchen mfcenalightweightmultiscalefeaturecooperativeenhancementnetworkforsingleimagesuperresolution
AT xindai mfcenalightweightmultiscalefeaturecooperativeenhancementnetworkforsingleimagesuperresolution
AT licao mfcenalightweightmultiscalefeaturecooperativeenhancementnetworkforsingleimagesuperresolution
AT qingwuli mfcenalightweightmultiscalefeaturecooperativeenhancementnetworkforsingleimagesuperresolution