CLEAN technique in strip-map SAR for high-quality imaging

Abstract

The maximum obtainable resolution of a strip-map synthetic aperture radar (SAR) system can be retained by simply avoiding weighting, or tapering, data samples in the along-track compression process. However, this will lead to hazardous artifacts caused by strong sidelobes of the corresponding adjacent scatterers whose interference might severely weaken the desired targets or even introduce false targets. On the other hand, some residual artifacts, even after tapering process, may still deteriorate the quality (contrast) of the SAR image. These issues can be remedied by applying the so-called CLEAN technique, which can mitigate these ill-effects in strip-map SAR imagery while maintaining the maximum resolution. This, indeed, is carried out as a post processing step, i.e., after the azimuth compression is accomplished, in the SAR system. The objective of this paper is to extend the CLEAN technique to strip-map SAR system to produce high-quality images with a very good along-track resolution. The algorithm is then applied to data from a ground-based circular SAR (CSAR) system to verify its implementation as well as this new application of the CLEAN technique.