Polarimetric Analysis of Dual Polarimetric SAR Imagery

Inhalt:
Analysis of dual polarimetric SAR imagery has taken on new importance with the recent launches of the POLSAR and TERRASAR-X polarimetric SAR systems, and the soon to be launched RADARSAT-2 polarimetric SAR. While these space borne polarimetric SARs can provide full polarimetric imagery, a majority of the collected imagery will be restricted to dual polarimetric imaging modes. Here we develop polarimetric analysis methods specific to the dual-pol imagery modes typically available from the new space borne SAR systems, i.e. (HH, VH), (VV, HV) and (VV, HH). We employ available quad-pol imagery as the baseline for all comparisons. From the full quad-pol data we extract the data corresponding to each individual dual-pol imaging modes. We pay particular attention to the information content of each dual-pol imaging mode, comparing them against the quad-pol imaging results. Other points of comparison are the hybrid dual-pol modes, e.g. transmitting a circular polarization and coherently receiving H and V linear polarizations. These dual polarimetric analysis methods aid the interpretation and application of dual polarimetric SAR imagery.