Atpresent,boththepointsourceandtheimagingpolarizationnavigationdevicesonlycanoutputtheangleinformation,whichmeansthatthevelocityinformationofthecarriercannotbeextractedfromthepolarizationfieldpatterndirectly.Opticalflowisanimage-basedmethodforcalculatingthevelocityofpixelpointmovementinanimage.However,forordinaryopticalflow,thedifferenceinpixelvalueaswellasthecalculationaccuracycanbereducedinweaklight.Polarizationimagingtechnologyhastheabilitytoimproveboththedetectionaccuracyandtherecognitionprobabilityofthetargetbecauseitcanacquiretheextrapolarizationmulti-dimensionalinformationoftargetradiationorreflection.Inthispaper,combiningthepolarizationimagingtechniquewiththetraditionalopticalflowalgorithm,apolarizationopticalflowalgorithmisproposed,anditisverifiedthatthepolarizedopticalflowalgorithmhasgoodadaptationinweaklightandcanimprovetheapplicationrangeofpolarizationnavigationsensors.Thisresearchlaysthefoundationfordayandnightall-weatherpolarizationnavigationapplicationsinfuture.
