An Internal Calibration Scheme for Polarimetric Synthetic Aperture Radar System

Two important aspects of internal calibration of polarimetric synthetic aperture radar are discussed, i.e., system gain calibration and individual transmit/receive module (TRM) calibration. System gain variation is measured, utilizing the internal calibration loop. A dual-channel TRM gain and phase calibration is carried out using orthogonal phase coding, where a signal of individual TRM is phase encoded according to a set of orthogonal codes in order to be separated from the composite calibration signal of all TRMs. Calibration results are developed both theoretically and through simulation in the case of TRM failure. Error introduced by phase-shifter toggling inaccuracy is discussed. A cross talk model is used to investigate the effect of imperfect isolation between the two polarization channels of each TRM on the calibration error.