BSE-YOLO: An Enhanced Lightweight Multi-Scale Underwater Object Detection Model

Underwater images often exhibit characteristics such as low contrast, blurred and small targets, object clustering, and considerable variations in object morphology. Traditional detection methods tend to be susceptible to omission and false positives under these circumstances. Furthermore, owing to...

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Main Authors: Yuhang Wang, Hua Ye, Xin Shu
Format: Article
Language:English
Published: MDPI AG 2025-06-01
Series:Sensors
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Online Access:https://www.mdpi.com/1424-8220/25/13/3890
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author Yuhang Wang
Hua Ye
Xin Shu
author_facet Yuhang Wang
Hua Ye
Xin Shu
author_sort Yuhang Wang
collection DOAJ
description Underwater images often exhibit characteristics such as low contrast, blurred and small targets, object clustering, and considerable variations in object morphology. Traditional detection methods tend to be susceptible to omission and false positives under these circumstances. Furthermore, owing to the constrained memory and limited computing power of underwater robots, there is a significant demand for lightweight models in underwater object detection tasks. Therefore, we propose an enhanced lightweight YOLOv10n-based model, BSE-YOLO. Firstly, we replace the original neck with an improved Bidirectional Feature Pyramid Network (Bi-FPN) to reduce parameters. Secondly, we propose a Multi-Scale Attention Synergy Module (MASM) to enhance the model’s perception of difficult features and make it focus on the important regions. Finally, we integrate Efficient Multi-Scale Attention (EMA) into the backbone and neck to improve feature extraction and fusion. The experiment results demonstrate that the proposed BSE-YOLO reaches 83.7% <i>mAP</i>@0.5 on URPC2020 and 83.9% <i>mAP</i>@0.5 on DUO, with the parameters reducing 2.47 M. Compared to the baseline model YOLOv10n, our BSE-YOLO improves <i>mAP</i>@0.5 by 2.2% and 3.0%, respectively, while reducing the number of parameters by approximately 0.2 M. The BSE-YOLO achieves a good balance between accuracy and lightweight, providing an effective solution for underwater object detection.
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spelling doaj-art-0e537e6cc3974ef288e69a11245dfb4f2025-08-20T02:36:22ZengMDPI AGSensors1424-82202025-06-012513389010.3390/s25133890BSE-YOLO: An Enhanced Lightweight Multi-Scale Underwater Object Detection ModelYuhang Wang0Hua Ye1Xin Shu2School of Computer Science, Jiangsu University of Science and Technology, Zhenjiang 212100, ChinaSchool of Computer Science, Jiangsu University of Science and Technology, Zhenjiang 212100, ChinaSchool of Computer Science, Jiangsu University of Science and Technology, Zhenjiang 212100, ChinaUnderwater images often exhibit characteristics such as low contrast, blurred and small targets, object clustering, and considerable variations in object morphology. Traditional detection methods tend to be susceptible to omission and false positives under these circumstances. Furthermore, owing to the constrained memory and limited computing power of underwater robots, there is a significant demand for lightweight models in underwater object detection tasks. Therefore, we propose an enhanced lightweight YOLOv10n-based model, BSE-YOLO. Firstly, we replace the original neck with an improved Bidirectional Feature Pyramid Network (Bi-FPN) to reduce parameters. Secondly, we propose a Multi-Scale Attention Synergy Module (MASM) to enhance the model’s perception of difficult features and make it focus on the important regions. Finally, we integrate Efficient Multi-Scale Attention (EMA) into the backbone and neck to improve feature extraction and fusion. The experiment results demonstrate that the proposed BSE-YOLO reaches 83.7% <i>mAP</i>@0.5 on URPC2020 and 83.9% <i>mAP</i>@0.5 on DUO, with the parameters reducing 2.47 M. Compared to the baseline model YOLOv10n, our BSE-YOLO improves <i>mAP</i>@0.5 by 2.2% and 3.0%, respectively, while reducing the number of parameters by approximately 0.2 M. The BSE-YOLO achieves a good balance between accuracy and lightweight, providing an effective solution for underwater object detection.https://www.mdpi.com/1424-8220/25/13/3890underwater object detectionYOLOv10nbidirectional feature pyramid networkmulti-scale attention synergylightweight network
spellingShingle Yuhang Wang
Hua Ye
Xin Shu
BSE-YOLO: An Enhanced Lightweight Multi-Scale Underwater Object Detection Model
Sensors
underwater object detection
YOLOv10n
bidirectional feature pyramid network
multi-scale attention synergy
lightweight network
title BSE-YOLO: An Enhanced Lightweight Multi-Scale Underwater Object Detection Model
title_full BSE-YOLO: An Enhanced Lightweight Multi-Scale Underwater Object Detection Model
title_fullStr BSE-YOLO: An Enhanced Lightweight Multi-Scale Underwater Object Detection Model
title_full_unstemmed BSE-YOLO: An Enhanced Lightweight Multi-Scale Underwater Object Detection Model
title_short BSE-YOLO: An Enhanced Lightweight Multi-Scale Underwater Object Detection Model
title_sort bse yolo an enhanced lightweight multi scale underwater object detection model
topic underwater object detection
YOLOv10n
bidirectional feature pyramid network
multi-scale attention synergy
lightweight network
url https://www.mdpi.com/1424-8220/25/13/3890
work_keys_str_mv AT yuhangwang bseyoloanenhancedlightweightmultiscaleunderwaterobjectdetectionmodel
AT huaye bseyoloanenhancedlightweightmultiscaleunderwaterobjectdetectionmodel
AT xinshu bseyoloanenhancedlightweightmultiscaleunderwaterobjectdetectionmodel