Development of a scattering model for bean fields from scatterometer system and X-band SAR

This paper presents a scattering model and measurements of backscattering coefficients for bean fields. The polarimetric radar backscatters of a bean field were measured using the ground-based X-band polarimetric scatterometer in an angular range from 20° to 60° in 2009 and 2010. The backscattering coefficients were also obtained using the COSMO-SkyMed (Spotlight mode, HH-mode) from July to October 2010. The backscattering coefficients of the bean field were computed using the first-order radiative transfer model (RTM) with field-measured input parameters. The bean layer is composed of the stems, branches, leaves, and the beans. Therefore, the stems, branches, and beans are counted as the cylinders, the leaves are accounted for by the leaves. It was found that the estimated backscattering coefficients agree quite well with the field-measured radar backscattering coefficients.