Title :
A Temporal Decorrelation Model for Polarimetric Radar Interferometers
Author :
Lavalle, Marco ; Simard, Marc ; Hensley, Scott
Author_Institution :
Jet Propulsion Lab., California Inst. of Technol., Pasadena, CA, USA
fDate :
7/1/2012 12:00:00 AM
Abstract :
This paper describes a physical model of the temporal changes that occur in vegetated land surfaces observed by a repeat-pass radar interferometer. We assume the temporal changes to be caused by a Gaussian-statistic motion of the vegetation elements, with motion variance changing along the vertical direction. We show that the temporal correlation between two interferometric radar signals is affected by the structural parameters of the vegetation, such as canopy height, and varies with the wave polarization. We validate the model using L-band data acquired by the Jet Propulsion Laboratory with the Uninhabited Aerial Vehicle Synthetic Aperture Radar airborne radar. This work provides new insights into the role of temporal decorrelation in interferometric radar applications.
Keywords :
Gaussian processes; airborne radar; decorrelation; geophysical image processing; geophysical techniques; radar interferometry; radar polarimetry; remote sensing by radar; synthetic aperture radar; vegetation; Gaussian statistic motion; L-band data; airborne radar; canopy height; interferometric radar signal; motion variance; polarimetric radar interferometer; repeat-pass radar interferometer; temporal decorrelation model; uninhabited aerial vehicle synthetic aperture radar; vegetated land surfaces; vegetation elements; wave polarization; Atmospheric modeling; Coherence; Correlation; Data models; Decorrelation; Radar; Decorrelation; interferometry; polarimetry; synthetic aperture radar (SAR);
Journal_Title :
Geoscience and Remote Sensing, IEEE Transactions on
DOI :
10.1109/TGRS.2011.2174367