Fractional RDA and enhanced FrCSA for SAR imaging

Synthetic Aperture Radar systems are used to form high resolution images from radar backscattered signals. The Fractional Fourier transform (FrFT), which is a generalized form of the well-known Fourier transform, has opened up the possibility of a new range of potentially promising and useful applications that involve the use and detection of chirp signals including pattern recognition and SAR imaging. In this paper the FrFT is applied to the well established Range Doppler Algorithm and to the Chirp Scaling Algorithm to form the FrRDA and eFrCSA (enhanced Fractional CSA). The performance of the algorithms are assessed using simulated and real Radarsat-1 data sets. The results confirm that the FrFT based SAR processing methods provide enhanced resolution yielding superior focusing accuracy and target detection.