Instrument Characteristics and Data Products for NASA's Next SAR Mission
Explore the source record for details and available documents.
Engineering topics
Publications and source records attributed to Huneycutt, B..
Explore the source record for details and available documents.
Advances in spaceborne Synthetic Aperture Radar (SAR) remote sensing technology make it possible to acquire global-scale data sets that provide unique information about the Earth's continually changing surface characteristics.
Explore the source record for details and available documents.
Spaceborne active sensors have been used for several years to study the Earth's surface and atmosphere.
Explore the source record for details and available documents.
Explore the source record for details and available documents.
A design constraint traceable to the early days of spaceborne Synthetic Aperture Radar (SAR) is known as teh minimum antenna area constraint for SAR.
A design constraint traceable ot the early days of spaceborne Synthetic Aperture Radar (SAR) is known as the minimum antenna area constraint for SAR. In this paper, it is confirmed that this constraint strictly applies only to the case where both the best possible resolution and the widest possible swath are the design goals. SAR antennas with area smaller than the constraint allows are shown to be possible, have been used on spaceborne SAR missions in the past, and should permit further, lower-cost SAR mission in the future.
The SEASAT Synthetic-Aperture Radar (SAR) system, the data processors, the extent of the image data set, and the means by which a user obtains this data are described and the data quality is evaluated. The user is alerted to some potential problems with the existing volume of SEASAT SAR image data, and allows him to modify his use of that data accordingly. Secondly, the manual focuses on the ultimate focuses on the ultimate capabilities of the raw data set and evaluates the potential of this data for processing into accurately located, amplitude-calibrated imagery of high resolution. This allows the user to decide whether his needs require special-purpose data processing of the SAR raw data.
The Seasat Synthetic Aperture Radar is described with emphasis placed on those aspects of the system that affect the amplitude calibration of the radar. Imagery produced by several Seasat passes over Death Valley, California are examined in an effort to determine the reproducibility of the data and the potential for relative and absolute calibration of the overall SAR image data set.
Basic engineering data regarding the Interim Digital SAR Processor (IDP) and the digitally correlated Seasat synthetic aperature radar (SAR) imagery are presented. The correlation function and IDP hardware/software configuration are described, and a preliminary performance assessment presented. The geometric and radiometric characteristics, with special emphasis on those peculiar to the IDP produced imagery, are described.
A computer simulation program that is used to study the effects of digitization in spaceborne synthetic aperture radar systems is described. An analytical study of the distortion noise introduced by the digitization process at various gain settings, sampling rates and bit error rates is presented and the results agree well with those obtained from the simulation program. The simulation program is also used to study the spatial frequency response of hard-limiting (quantizing to 1-bit) synthetic aperture radar systems. The implications of these results on synthetic aperture radar system design are discussed.