Study of the polarimetric characteristics of mud flats in an intertidal zone using C- and X- band spaceborne SAR data

Abstract

The polarimetric characteristics of a mud flat area in the intertidal zone near Jiangsu, China, are analyzed under different environmental conditions using X-band and C-band spaceborne synthetic aperture radar (SAR) data from the TerraSAR-X (TSX) and Radarsat-2 (R2) satellites. The dominant scattering mechanisms of different objects, including mud flats and aquaculture facilities in the intertidal zone, are studied based on the polarimetric target decomposition of fully polarimetric R2 data. The polarimetric characteristics of different objects in the intertidal zone are quantitatively compared using the depolarization parameters derived from the R2 data, which indicate that tides have different effects on the dominant scattering mechanisms of the mud flats and aquaculture farms. Furthermore, comparisons of the C-band and X-band polarimetric characteristics of the mud flats and aquaculture farms in the intertidal zone are analyzed by combining the TSX and R2 data. The results show that surface scattering is the dominant mechanism of the mud flats, whereas different dominant mechanisms occur in the aquaculture areas present during different tides. Interestingly, strikingly similar polarimetric characteristics of mud flats and aquaculture in X- and C-band SAR are observed, and these novel results were achieved through a depolarization analysis based on the TSX and R2 data in synergy.