Aperture-Dependent Injection of Ionospheric Perturbations Into Simulated SAR Data

Abstract

This letter presents an algorithm for the introduction of ionospheric disturbances into synthetic aperture radar (SAR) simulations in an aperture-dependent manner using subapertures. Its suitability is compared with other methods that follow the beam-center approximation. The method can be generalized to the injection of all kinds of disturbances, and its two main benefits are the accuracy of the squint angle accommodation inside the synthetic aperture and the possibility of neglecting the static ionosphere assumption. For example, realistic ionospheric disturbance maps (phase and intensity scintillation) are introduced into clutter images simulated for the Biomass mission. In this case, with a typical ionospheric irregularity height of 350 km, the limiting azimuth resolution of the irregularities to be injected is around 337 m.