Multifrequency and multitemporal ground-based scatterometers measurements on rice fields

This paper presents the backscattering coefficients of rice fields using an L, S, C and X-band scatterometer system during the growth period for a rice field. The system has full-polarizations (vv, vh, hv & hh) and can view various incidence angles (0°~90°) and azimuth angles (0°~360°). The field measurements were performed in Qionglai County of Chengdu (China) for the 2009 rice growing season. The rice parameters, including biomass, leaf-area index (LAI) and canopy structure were also measured experimentally in the field. The full-polarizations backscatter measurements at L, S, C and X-band have been analyzed as a function of the incidence angle, and the temporal variations of full-polarizations at four selected 35° incidence angles have been compared with the temporal variation of rice biomass and LAI. The results indicate that the backscattering coefficients have a strong correlation with the biomass and LAI, especially in the L and S-band. Therefore, the ground-based scatterometer is an effective tool for estimating rice growth.