Microwave Radar Remote Sensing

Gulab Singh ([email protected])

Microwave Remote Sensing :
Sensors operates in Microwave spectrum ( λ 1mm to 1m)

Microwave
Why Microwaves for Remote Sensing
• All weather Capability
• Day-night ability (independent of Sun illumination)
• Penetration through a medium than optical waves
• Information through Microwave is different from that
available from Visible and IR regions
• Microwaves respond to dielectric and geometric
properties of various features
SIR-C/X-SAR Images of a Portion of Rondonia,
Brazil, Obtained on April 10, 1994

Effect of Rainfall on X-SAR images

Oct. 7, 1994 April 18, 1994
Penetration of Microwaves
Microwave interaction and response with object/media

• Scattering at the air-media interface.

• Scattering inside the medium

• Scattering at the media-ground interface

Air
A

• Sub-ground (if exists) B media

C

Ground
D
 Nov. 2014

Double Bounce Scattering

Volume Scattering
Surface Scattering

L-band Quad Pol. (HH/VH/HV/VV)

Radar data based generated
scattering component RGB color
coded images over Nepal earthquake
region

June 2015
Sahara desert,
Egypt

Landsat MSS

SIR-A L-band

Lillesand & Kiefer

 Penetration Depth
Soil Snow
Types of Microwave Remote Sensing

Radar
Radiometer

Radio detection and Ranging

Microwave Radar Remote Sensing (MRRS)
Configuration of Microwave Radar Remote Sensing Systems

• Monostatic
• Bistatic
Radar systems with a spatial separation between transmitter and
receiver are called bistatic.
• Multi-Static
Systems with multiple receivers are called multistatic.

monostatic bi/multistatic
Types of Microwave Radar Remote Sensing Systems: Configuration

Fully Active and Semi active Radar System

Passive

Active
 Types of Microwave Radar Remote Sensing Sensors
(Aperture)

Real Aperture Radar Synthetic Aperture Radar

(RAR) (SAR)

Those systems wherein beamwidth is controlled

by the physical length of antenna are called RARs
Principle of RADAR
 0.1microsecond

Side-Looking Radar
System Operation
Elements of a Typical Remote Sensing Radar
Range

………………

azimuth
………………
………………
………………

Range : Range is the line of sight

distance between the radar and each
illuminated scatterer.

Azimuth : Along track direction or

direction of flight path. In the image,
line number is related to azimuth.
 Side looking Radar
Nomenclature
• Nadir
• azimuth flight direction
• range
H • depression angle
look angles
• incident angle
• altitude above-ground-level, H

Nadir
The nadir is the direction pointing
directly below a particular location
 Azimuth Direction
• The aircraft travels in a straight line that is called the azimuth
flight direction.

• Pulses of active microwave electromagnetic energy illuminate

strips of the terrain at right angles (orthogonal) to the aircraft’s
direction of travel, which is called the range or look direction.

• The terrain illuminated nearest the aircraft in the line of sight is

called the near-range. The farthest point of terrain illuminated by
the pulse of energy is called the far-range.
Range Direction or Look Direction
• The range or look direction for any radar image is the direction
of the radar illumination that is at right angles to the direction
the aircraft or spacecraft is traveling.
• Generally, objects that trend (or strike) in a direction that is
orthogonal (perpendicular) to the range or look direction are
enhanced much more than those objects in the terrain that lie
parallel to the look direction. Consequently, linear features that
appear dark or are imperceptible in a radar image using one
look direction may appear bright in another radar image with
a different look direction.
a.
X - band, HH polarization look direction

b.
s
X - band, HH polarization look direction
Look Angle
• A radar system’s look angle is the angle from nadir to a point of
interest on ground

• varies from the near-range look angle to the far-range look angle.
Depression Angle
• The complement of the look angle is called the depression angle.

• The depression angle is the angle between a horizontal plane extending

out from the aircraft fuselage and the electromagnetic pulse of energy
from the antenna to a specific point on the ground.

• The depression angle within a strip of illuminated terrain varies from the
near-range depression angle to the far-range depression angle.

• The average depression angle of a radar image is computed by selecting

a point midway between the near and far-range in the image strip.
Incident Angle
• The incident angle is the angle between the incident radar beam at the
ground and the normal to the earth’s surface at the point of incidence .

• Over the flat terrain, the incident angle is approximately equal to the look
angle

• Varies from the near-range incident angle to the far-range incident angle.

• There topographic effect on incident angle

Local Incident
angle
RADAR Resolution Cell
• The spatial resolution cell size of side looking radar system is
controlled by two independent sensing system parameters:
 Pulse Length
The pulse length of the radar signal is determined by the
length of time that the antenna emits its burst of energy.
Pulse length dictates the range resolution

Antenna Beamwidth (the width of antenna beam)

The width of antenna beam determines the resolution cell size in
the azimuth direction.
 Slant Range Resolution
Ability of a radar to distinguish two closely spaced objects in range directions
R = c/2 = PL/2
cτ=PL is the pulse length

Here, separation
of objects (A&B)
Separation is more than PL/2. in range is less
No overlap of return signal than PL/2.
Slant Range vs Ground Range Resolutions
R = c/2
c
Rg 
2 cos  d
c
Rg  Since d=90-l
2 sin  l

Rg

c
2
An example:
Radar Pulse duration  = 0.1 s
θd = 450
Ground Range Resolution = c/2 cos θd
= 3.0 x 108x0.1 x10-6/(2x 0.707)
= 21 m
Azimuth Resolution
• So far we have only identified the length in meters of an active
microwave resolution element at a specific depression angle and
pulse length in the range (across-track) direction.

• To know both the length and width of the resolution element, we

must also compute the width of the resolution element in the
direction the azimuth direction.
Azimuth Resolution
• Azimuth resolution (Ra) is determined by computing the width of the terrain strip
that is illuminated by the radar beam.

 R  is Angular beamwitdh of antenna

Azimuth Resolution R a= R * 

• Real aperture active microwave radars produce a lobe-shaped beam which is

narrower in the near-range and spreads out in the far-range.
Azimuth Resolution
• The angular beamwidth is directly proportional to the wavelength of
the transmitted pulse of energy and inversely proportional the
antenna length
𝜆
𝛽=
𝑙
This means that the longer the wavelength, the wider the beam width,
and the shorter the wavelength, the narrower the beam width.
Therefore, in real aperture radars a shorter wavelength pulse will result
in improved azimuth resolution. Unfortunately, the shorter the
wavelength, the poorer the atmospheric and vegetation penetration
capability.
Azimuth Resolution
• Fortunately, the beam width is also inversely proportional to antenna
length (l). This means that the longer the radar antenna, the narrower the
beam width and the higher the azimuth resolution. The relationship
between wavelength (l) and antenna length (l) is summarized below, which
can be used to compute the azimuth resolution:

𝜆
Ra=R
𝑙

• where R is the range distance to the point of interest. In space-bone

platform case R will be several hundred kilometers (600 to 800 km)
 Ra= S.
Azimuth Resolution
(depends on altitude) = l/L
Ra = S. l/L
Where L is length of
l antenna (10 m).
H S1
S2 S = H/cos l
(For Aircraft altitude

For H=10 km, l= 230,

l=5.66 cm
Ra= 60 meters
(For Satellite altitude
For H=765 km
Ra = 4.6978 km
Very poor azimuth resolution
Synthetic Aperture Radar
• The deficiencies of RAR operation are overcome in SAR system.
• Remember, in a real aperture radar system that the size of the
antenna (l) is inversely proportional to the size of the angular beam
width. Great improvement in azimuth resolution could be realized if a
longer antenna were used.
• Engineers have developed procedures to synthesize a very long
antenna electronically. Like a real aperture radar, a synthetic aperture
radar also uses a relatively small antenna (e.g., 1 m) that sends out a
relatively broad beam perpendicular to the aircraft. The major
difference is that a greater number of additional beams are sent
toward the object. Doppler principles are then used to monitor the
returns from all these additional microwave pulses to synthesize the
azimuth resolution to become one very narrow beam
 Antenna “length” is increased
synthetically by building up a history of
backscattered signals from the landscape
Synthetic Aperture Radar along the track of the sensor
Improvement in Azimuth Resolution
Integration time
𝐿𝑆𝐴 𝜆
s= =R
v v𝑙
Real SAR Antenna
aperture azimuth
beamwidth ()  𝐒𝐲𝐧𝐭𝐡𝐞𝐭𝐢𝐜 𝐀𝐩𝐞𝐫𝐭𝐮𝐫𝐞
Along track antenna 𝜆
real length = l 𝐿𝑆𝐴 =R=R
 = l/l
𝑙

𝜆 𝑅𝜆 𝑙
𝛿𝐴𝑇 = R = 2𝑅𝜆 =
2𝐿𝑆𝐴 2
𝑙
 Fundamental Radar Equation
The fundamental radar equation is:
1 1
Pr = Pt x Gt ____  Ar
4Rt2 4Rr2

where Pr is power received, Pt is the power transmitted toward the target, Gt is

the gain of the antenna in the direction of the target, R (= Rt = Rr Monostatic)is
the range distance from the transmitter to the target,  is the effective scatter
area of the target (radar cross section RCS), and Ar is the area of the receiving
antenna.
RCS

is valid for those cases in which the target of interest is smaller than the radar coverage, that is, a point target.
A0
 Radar Backscatter Coefficient, ˚ : Monostatic Radar

Finally, it is the effects of terrain on the radar signal that we are most interested in, i.e.
the amount of radar cross-section,  , reflected back to the receiver, per unit area A0 on
the ground. This is called the radar backscatter coeffieient ( ˚) and is computed as :

• The radar backscatter coefficient determines the percentage of electro- magnetic

energy reflected back to the radar from within a resolution cell, e.g. 10 x 10 m.
 Microwave radar interaction and backscattering responses depend:

•Object Parameters: Physical factors such as the dielectric constant of

the surface materials which also depends strongly on the moisture
content;

• Surface/Terrain Parameters: Geometric factors such as surface

roughness, slopes, orientation of the objects relative to the radar beam
direction;

•Sensor Parameters: Microwave frequency, polarisation and incident

angle.

Radar Return = f (dielectric constant) x(surface roughness) x (angle of incidence)

Dielectric Constant

dielectric constant of liquid water is 80; dry soil is 2-4.

 Penetration Depth

Penetration depth can be written with some approximations

ε’ >> ε” as
 L

Sept. 05 Jan.19 April 20 (L-band, 2008)

Sept. 06 Feb. 20 May 08 (X-band, 2009)