Future developments in satellite synthetic aperture radar
Abstract
The major advantage of a spaceborne SAR is its ability to image the earth in all weather conditions, day or night. This means that it is particularly suitable for those applications where information is required quickly, and implies that the SAR must be able to image parts of the earth's surface at frequent intervals. However, it is also necessary to provide different frequencies and polarizations to meet the requirements of different applications. This increases the amount of data which has to be transmitted and can limit the swath width and hence the ability of a SAR to image a particular scene with minimum delay. This paper examines this conflict of requirements and proposes a development sequence for operational SAR systems.
- Publication:
-
Dresden International Astronautical Federation Congress
- Pub Date:
- October 1990
- Bibcode:
- 1990dres.iafcW....K
- Keywords:
-
- Earth Observations (From Space);
- Satellite Imagery;
- Satellite-Borne Radar;
- Synthetic Aperture Radar;
- Backscattering;
- Imaging Radar;
- Phased Arrays;
- Polarization (Waves);
- Synthetic Apertures;
- Weather Forecasting;
- Spacecraft Instrumentation