Abstract: An underwater image enhancement algorithm using gated fusion generative adversarial network was proposed for solving problems of underwater image color distortion, low contrast, and heavy fogging. The crucial element of this algorithm is that it recruited a generator to pixel-by-pixel restore image feature details and synthesized a clear image through gated fusion. First of all, to increase the variety of image feature learning by the network, several parallel sub-networks were employed to learn different kinds of spatial feature knowledge of the same image. The image features learned from different sub-networks were fused utilizing gated fusion. The generator and the discriminator were used for mutual games, and the network was repeatedly trained to obtain enhanced underwater images. Finally, using the EUVP dataset and the U45 testset, this paper performed a series of comparative experiments. The algorithm’s key point matching was 19 points higher than the raw image, according to the experimental results. The average UCIQE value was 0.664 7, while the average UIQM value was 5.723 7. It can achieve improvements over other classic and latest algorithms, demonstrating the algorithm’s extraordinary performance. 

Key words: image processing, underwater image, generative adversarial network, multi-scale input, gated fusion