Synthetic Aperture Radar at The Alaska SAR Facility

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Synthetic Aperture Radar atThe Alaska SAR
Facility

• Chris Wyatt
• Data Specialist
• cwyatt_at_gi.alaska.edu
• [phone]
• www.asf.alaska.edu

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Overall Mission

• The Alaska SAR Facility provides satellite data,
  software tools and information to the science
  community and government operational agencies in
  support of polar research and earth science.

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What is SAR?

• Synthetic Aperture Radar (SAR) is an active
  remote sensing technology that uses microwave
  energy to illuminate the surface.
• The system records the elapsed time and energy of
  the return pulse received by the antenna.
• At wavelengths of about 2 cm, these instruments
  can collect data about the Earths surface day or
  night, regardless of cloud cover.

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Backscatter

• Definition the amount of energy returned to the
  receiver, which determines the brightness of
  the pixel
• Backscatter is a function of
• wavelength and incidence angle of the radar
  signal
• roughness and dielectric constant of the
  reflecting surface

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Applications of SAR

• Sea ice characteristics
• Flooding
• Archaeology
• Ocean circulation
• Wetlands
• Structural geology

• Land cover
• Volcanology
• Glaciology
• Phytoplankton distribution
• Soil moisture
• Crustal deformation

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ASF User Community

• Worldwide user community
• 170 projects
• Multiple principle investigators
• Graduate students
• Undergraduate students
• Interns
• Sun workstations and SGIs

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Foreign Missions Supported
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SAR User Tools Development Status
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EOS-HDF data available at ASF

• Current data availability
• SAR imagery is available only in CEOS format
• Derived products (GPS products) are available in
  custom binary or ascii formats
• Future plans
• ASF would like to support EOS-HDF formatted SAR
  imagery products - this will most likely occur
  when the ECS is installed at ASF
• ASF currently assessing applicability of EOS-HDF
  for RGPS products (ice motion, ice age, ice
  thickness, open water fraction, melt onset/freeze
  up, wind/temp/pressure field products)