Investigations on the Advanced SAR Processing Algorithms for Security Applications with Distributed Sensing

Abstract

A distributed airborne/spaceborne SAR system, that consists of a set of monostatic and/or bistatic SARs, offers many advantages thanks to the bi-/multi-aperture reception. In particular, distributed SAR systems offer the opportunity to improve revisit times, access range, image throughput, swath width, or resolution, making it suitable to overcome the challenges of next generation radar remote sensing systems. In the frame of the ESA-ESRIN contract “Next Generation Processing Methods for Security Applications: Distributed Sensing”, the main objective of the work has been to develop advanced SAR processing algorithms for security applications with a focus on the angular diversity provided by multistaic constellations, and how to implementation such applications as operational services. The selected algorithms are composed of a wide range of security applications using angular diversity, and the spaceborne and airborne SAR data considered for verification are from different providers (DLR's spaceborne TerraSAR-X, TanDEM-X sensors and airborne DBF-SAR sensor, Capella Space and ICEYE), hence providing a unique opportunity to verify and validate the implemented algorithms. We have investigated five advanced SAR algorithms under four main applications. This paper introduces these algorithms and demonstrates their results, limitations, and proposes potential improvements.