According to the principle of support vector machine (SVM) and the inter-class separability rule of hyperspectral
data, a novel binary tree SVM classifier based on separability measure among different classes is proposed
for hyperspectral image classification. J–M distance is used to measure the separability in order to
generate the binary tree automatically. By experiments using airborne operational modular imaging spectrometer
II (OMIS II) data, satellite EO-1 Hyperion hyperspectral data and airborne AVIRIS data, the classification
accuracy of different multi-class SVMs is obtained and compared. Experimental results indicate that
the proposed adaptive binary tree classifier outperforms other existing multi-class SVM strategies. Use of
the adaptive binary tree SVM classifier is a novel approach to improve the accuracy of hyperspectral image
classification and expand the possibilities for interpretation and application of hyperspectral remote sensing
image.