Investigations on Attenuation Effects in SAR imaging

Kurzfassung

TerraSAR-X, the first German synthetic aperture radar (SAR) satellite has been launched in 2007, June 14th, 4:14 o`clock. Acquired data sets in X – band offer new possibilities to scrutinize the disturbance on SAR images due to weather phenomena occurring in the troposphere. We investigate on the potential influence of weather effects on space-borne synthetic aperture radar. In a first step we provide an estimate on the potential influence of rain (attenuation) on SAR imaging according typically weather scenarios. Hereby estimates of attenuation of microwave SAR signals are provided. A theoretical evaluation of the atmospheric influence on SAR imaging is given and the potential of TerraSAR-X in order to serve as an investigation tool will be evaluated. Furthermore a discussion on the potential of TerraSAR-X to extract high resolution precipitation pattern is given.