Detection, Estimation and Compensation of Ionospheric Effect on SAR Interferogram Using Azimuth Shift

doi:10.11947/j.JGGS.2022.0103

Abstract

Abstract:

An increasing interest in the use of low frequency Synthetic Aperture Radar (SAR) systems, e.g., L- and P-bands, makes the research of the ionospheric effects on SAR interferograms become urgent and significant. As the most pronounced signature in interferograms, the ionosphere-induced azimuth streak was thoroughly investigated in this study through processing of the 19 L-band Advanced Land-Observing Satellite (ALOS) Phased Array type L-band Synthetic Aperture Radar (PALSAR)images over the Chongqing City, China. The investigations show that the visible ionosphere-induced stripe-shape azimuth shifts with the invariable direction of 26°E, 113°N are observed in some interferometric pairs. Relating these anomalous azimuth shifts to the International GNSS Service (IGS) final ionospheric products shows that the detected ionosphere-contaminated SAR images display the relatively large ionospheric variation with time during SAR satellite travelled through the study area, indicating a somewhat correlation between them. After detecting the ionosphere-contaminated interferograms, we estimated the Ionospheric Phase Streak (IPS) based on an approximate linear relationship between IPS and azimuth shift, and then removed them from the original interferograms. The corrected results show that ionospheric phase patterns are largely removed from the ionosphere-contaminated interferograms. The investigation indicates that the direction of the IPS keeps approximately constant in space and time, which provides the potential chance to develop methods to correct the ionospheric effect. Furthermore, this study once more proves that the ionospheric effect on SAR interferogram can be detected, estimated and corrected from azimuth shifts.

Key words: Synthetic Aperture Radar (SAR); Interferometric SAR (InSAR); ionospheric effect; azimuth shift

Wu ZHU,Yang LEI,Quan SUN. Detection, Estimation and Compensation of Ionospheric Effect on SAR Interferogram Using Azimuth Shift[J]. Journal of Geodesy and Geoinformation Science, 2022, 5(1): 14-24.

Figures/Tables 11

Tab.1

Fig.1

Fig.2

Fig.3

Tab.2

Fig.4

Fig.5

Fig.6

Fig.7

Fig.8

Fig.9

References 35

[1]	OLIVER C, QUEGAN S. Understanding synthetic aperture radar images[M]. Norwood, MA: Artech House, 2004.
[2]	XU Zhengwen, WU Jian, WU Zhensen. Potential effects of the ionosphere on space-based SAR imaging[J]. IEEE Transactions on Antennas and Propagation, 2008, 56(7): 1968-1975. doi: 10.1109/TAP.2008.924695
[3]	BRCIC R, PARIZZI A, EINEDER M, et al. Estimation and compensation of ionospheric delay for SAR interferometry[C]// Proceedings of 2010 IEEE International Geoscience and Remote Sensing Symposium.Honolulu:IEEE, 2010: 2908-2911.
[4]	BRCIC R, PARIZZI A, EINEDER M, et al. Ionospheric effects in SAR interferometry: an analysis and comparison of methods for their estimation[C]// Proceedings of 2011 IEEE International Geoscience and Remote Sensing Symposium. Vancouver: IEEE, 2011: 1497-1500.
[5]	HANSSEN R F. Radar interferometry:data interpretation and error analysis[M]. Dordrecht:Kluwer Academic, 2001.
[6]	PI Xiaoqing, FREEMAN A, CHAPMAN B, et al. Imaging ionospheric inhomogeneities using spaceborne synthetic aperture radar[J]. Journal of Geophysical Research, 2011, 116(A4): A04303.
[7]	BICKEL S H, BATES R H T. Effects of magneto-ionic propagation on the polarization scattering matrix[J]. Proceedings of the IEEE, 1965, 53(8): 1089-1091. doi: 10.1109/PROC.1965.4097
[8]	RIGNOT E J M. Effect of Faraday rotation on L-band interferometric and polarimetric synthetic-aperture radar data[J]. IEEE Transactions on Geoscience and Remote Sensing, 2000, 38(1): 383-390. doi: 10.1109/36.823934
[9]	WRIGHT P A, QUEGAN S, WHEADON N S, et al. Faraday rotation effects on L-band spaceborne SAR data[J]. IEEE Transactions on Geoscience and Remote Sensing, 2003, 41(12): 2735-2744. doi: 10.1109/TGRS.2003.815399
[10]	FREEMAN A, SAATCHI SS. On the detection of Faraday rotation in linearly polarized L-band SAR backscatter signatures[J]. IEEE Transactions on Geoscience and Remote Sensing, 2004, 42(8): 1607-1616. doi: 10.1109/TGRS.2004.830163
[11]	MEYER F, NICOLL J. Mapping ionospheric TEC using faraday rotation in full- polarimetric L-band SAR data[C]// Proceedings of the 7th European Conference on Synthetic Aperture Radar.Friedrichshafen:VDE, 2008: 1-4.
[12]	MATTAR K E, GRAY A L. Reducing ionospheric electron density errors in satellite radar interferometry applications[J]. Canadian Journal of Remote Sensing, 2002, 28(4): 593-600.
[13]	WEGMULLER U, WERNER C, STROZZI T, et al. Ionospheric electron concentration effects on SAR and INSAR[C]// Proceedings of 2006 IEEE International Symposium on Geoscience and Remote Sensing. Denver: IEEE, 2006: 3731-3734.
[14]	LIU J, KUGA Y, ISHIMARU A, et al. Simulations of ionospheric effects on SAR at P-band[C]// Proceedings of IEEE 1999 International Geoscience and Remote Sensing Symposium. Hamburg:IEEE, 1999: 1842-1844.
[15]	LIU Jun, KUGAY, , ISHIMARU A, et al. Ionospheric effects on SAR imaging: A numerical study[J]. IEEE Transactions on Geoscience and Remote Sensing, 2003, 41(5): 939-947. doi: 10.1109/TGRS.2003.811813
[16]	BELCHER D P. Theoretical limits on SAR imposed by the ionosphere[J]. IET Radar, Sonar &Navigation, 2008, 2(6): 435-448. doi: 10.1049/iet-rsn:20070188
[17]	CHEN Jingyi, ZEBKERH A. Ionospheric artifacts in simultaneous L-Band InSAR and GPS observations[J]. IEEE Transactions on Geoscience and Remote Sensing, 2012, 50(4): 1227-1239. doi: 10.1109/TGRS.2011.2164805
[18]	DAVIES K, SMITH E K. Ionospheric effects on satellite land mobile systems[J]. IEEE Antennas and Propagation Magazine, 2002, 44(6): 24-31.
[19]	MEYER F. A review of ionospheric effects in low-frequency SAR-Signals, correction methods, and performance requirements[C]// Proceedings of 2010 IEEE International Geoscience and Remote Sensing Symposium. Honolulu: IEEE, 2010: 29-32.
[20]	MEYER F J. Performance requirements for ionospheric correction of low-frequency SAR data[J]. IEEE Transactions on Geoscience and Remote Sensing, 2011, 49(10): 3694-3702. doi: 10.1109/TGRS.2011.2146786
[21]	MEYER F, BAMLER R, JAKOWSKI N, et al. The potential of low-frequency SAR systems for mapping ionospheric TEC distributions[J]. IEEE Geoscience and Remote Sensing Letters, 2006, 3(4): 560-564. doi: 10.1109/LGRS.2006.882148
[22]	RAUCOULES D, DE MICHELE M. Assessing ionospheric influence on L-Band SAR data: Implications on coseismic displacement measurements of the 2008 Sichuan Earthquake[J]. IEEE Geoscience and Remote Sensing Letters, 2010, 7(2): 286-290. doi: 10.1109/LGRS.2009.2033317
[23]	JUNG H S, LEE D T, LU Zhong, et al. Ionospheric correction of SAR interferograms by multiple-aperture interferometry[J]. IEEE Transactions on Geoscience and Remote Sensing, 2013, 51(5): 3191-3199. doi: 10.1109/TGRS.2012.2218660
[24]	DAI Keren, RAN Peilian, LI Zhenhong, et al. Land subsidence in Xiong’an New Area, China revealed by InSAR observations[J]. Journal of Geodesy and Geoinformation Science, 2021, 4(1): 70-76.
[25]	ZHU Jianjun, XIE Qinghua, ZUO Tingying, et al. Complex least squares adjustment to improve tree height inversion problem in PolInSAR[J]. Journal of Geodesy and Geoinformation Science, 2019, 2(1): 1-8.
[26]	LIU Zhizhao, SKONE S, GAO Yang, et al. Ionospheric modeling using GPS data[J]. GPS Solutions, 2005, 9(1): 63-66. doi: 10.1007/s10291-004-0129-z
[27]	HERNÁNDEZ-PAJARESM. IGS ionosphere WG status report: performance of IGS ionosphere TEC maps[EB/OL]. [2020-09-10]. http://ftp.aiub.unibe.ch/igsws2004/Atmosphere_Ionosphere/FRAM1_Hernandez.pdf.
[28]	SCHAER S. Mapping and predicting the earth’s ionosphere using the global positioning system[D]. Berne:University of Berne, 1999.
[29]	CURLANDER J C, MCDONOUGH R N. Synthetic aperture radar: Systems and signal processing[M]. New York: John Wiley & Sons, 1991.
[30]	CHENEY M, BORDEN B. Synthetic aperture radar imaging[M]// SCHERZER O.Handbook of Mathematical Methods in Imaging. New York:Springer, 2011: 655-690.
[31]	BECHOR N B D, ZEBKER H A. Measuring two-dimensional movements using a single InSAR pair[J]. Geophysical Research Letters, 2006, 33(16): L16311. doi: 10.1029/2006GL026883
[32]	JUNG H S, WON J S, KIM SW. An improvement of the performance of multiple-aperture SAR interferometry (MAI)[J]. IEEE Transactions on Geoscience and Remote Sensing, 2009, 47(8): 2859-2869. doi: 10.1109/TGRS.2009.2016554
[33]	BARAN I, STEWART M P, KAMPES B M, et al. A modification to the Goldstein radar interferogram filter[J]. IEEE Transactions on Geoscience and Remote Sensing, 2003, 41(9): 2114-2118. doi: 10.1109/TGRS.2003.817212
[34]	COSTANTINI M, ROSEN P A. A generalized phase unwrapping approach for sparse data[C]// Proceedings of IEEE 1999 International Geoscience and Remote Sensing Symposium. Hamburg: IEEE, 1999: 267-269.
[35]	SCHAER S, GURTNER W, FELTENS J. IONEX: The ionosphere map exchange format version 1[C]// Proceedings of IGS AC Workshop. Darmstadt:Europe Space Agency, 1998.

No	Master	Slave	B_t/d	B_p/m
1	2007-07-09	2007-08-24	46	149
2	2007-07-09	2007-10-09	92	320
3	2007-08-24	2007-10-09	46	171
4	2007-08-24	2008-01-09	138	573
5	2007-10-09	2008-01-09	92	402
6	2008-01-09	2008-02-24	46	548
7	2008-02-24	2008-05-26	92	162
8	2008-07-11	2009-02-26	230	-536
9	2009-01-11	2009-02-26	46	90
10	2009-07-14	2009-08-29	46	295
11	2009-07-14	2009-10-14	92	259
12	2009-07-14	2010-01-14	184	558
13	2009-08-29	2009-10-14	46	-35
14	2009-08-29	2010-01-14	138	262
15	2009-10-14	2010-01-14	92	298
16	2010-01-14	2010-03-01	46	489
17	2010-07-17	2010-09-01	46	317
18	2010-07-17	2010-10-17	92	419
19	2010-09-01	2010-10-17	46	101
20	2010-09-01	2011-01-17	138	484
21	2010-10-17	2011-01-17	92	383
22	2011-01-17	2011-03-04	46	453