Atmospheric effects and product quality in the application of SAR interferometry

Kurzfassung

As commercial synthetic aperture radar (SAR) satellites like TerraSAR come into operation, the control of product quality becomes increasingly important. The propagation path can greatly impair imaging performance, particularly for multiple-pass interferometric SAR (InSAR) operation, which is highly sensitive to phase errors. The delay induced in the propagation of electromagnetic waves can be regarded as consisting of an ionospheric and a tropospheric component. This paper will review the potential impact of atmospheric effects on SAR and SAR interferometry with a particular emphasis on how these translate in terms of derived product quality and enduser benefit.