Absolute Radiometric Calibration of C-Band Transponders with Proven Plausibility

Inhalt:
The technological advancement of upcoming synthetic aperture radar (SAR) satellite missions leads to novel challenges for the reference targets as well. In order to provide a reference target for an accurate absolute radiometric calibration the knowledge of the backscattering characteristics is essential. Whereas usually a single measurement is used for the estimation of the radar cross section (RCS), this paper presents two conducted, independent methods to derive the RCS of DLR’s three new C-band transponders leading to cross-validated results based on a compatibility analysis.