A Lightweight Multiscale and Multiattention Hyperspectral Image Classification Network Based on Multistage Search

Hyperspectral image (HSI) classification has become a core task in hyperspectral remote sensing interpretation, with deep learning dominating due to its ability to learn hierarchical features without manual engineering. As the model complexity has grown, manual design limitations have prompted a shift to automated approaches such as differentiable architecture search (DARTS), where the architectures are optimized for greater accuracy and efficiency. However, applying gradient-based neural architecture search (NAS) methods directly to hyperspectral classification presents several challenges. Regarding search space design, there is a lack of lightweight operators that can mitigate the spectral variability, spatial heterogeneity, and scale differences inherent in hyperspectral imagery. In terms of search strategy, the traditional DARTS approach directly derives the topology from operation weights, which can lead to suboptimal topological structures, and thus affects the performance of the network in HSI classification. In this article, to address these issues, we propose L3M, which is a lightweight multiscale and multiattention HSI classification network based on multistage search. The proposed approach introduces a novel lightweight operator to address the spectral variability, spatial heterogeneity, and scale differences in HSIs. The operation search and topology search are also decomposed into a multistage process to prevent a suboptimal network by searching for and determining the topological order of the candidate operations in a predefined operation space. L3M was validated on four public datasets, where the proposed model demonstrated a superior classification performance, compared to other lightweight models, while maintaining a low parameter count, low model complexity, and high inference speed.