A Satellite Synthetic Aperture Radar Concept Using P-Band Signals of Opportunity

The spaceborne aperture radar (SAR) technique based on a combination of P-hand signals of opportunity (SoOp) reflectometry with a sparse array of receivers at low earth orbits (LEOs) and transmit signals from the United States Navy's Mobile User Objective System operating on a geosynchronous altitude has been analyzed. The design focuses on the forward-looking geometry near the specular direction, which allows a high surface reflectivity, in order to obtain adequate signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) with a moderate receiving antenna gain. The sparse array is utilized to sharpen the across-track resolution and reduce the iso-range ambiguity. The formulation for match filtering and illustrations of point target response are presented. This work shows that an array of five to seven receivers is able to achieve an across-track resolution of about 200 m in the outer portion of swath and about 1 km in the center part of swath. The along-track resolution can reach 10 m or better due to the feasibility of a long dwell time for Doppler filtering. We find that the sparse array allows the reduction of the iso-range ambiguity to a level of lower than 5% for a major portion of swath, similar to 70% or greater depending on the number of receivers and spacing. We have completed an SNR formulation, which can consistently account for both coherent and incoherent scattering regardless the spatial resolution. An analysis of SNR based on the Kirchhoff approximation for rough surface scattering has been performed. We find that it is possible to obtain a swath width of 100 km with an SNR of 5 dB or better for a constellation of seven satellites with a receiving antenna directivity of 15 dBi at a LEO altitude of 675 km for a wide range of surface roughness. Our study suggests the promise of the SoOpSAR concept for high-resolution remote sensing of land surfaces.

Automated summary

The study analyzed the spaceborne aperture radar (SAR) technique based on a combination of signals from the United States Navy's Mobile User Objective System and P-hand signals of opportunity with a sparse array of receivers at low earth orbits. The design focused on forward-looking geometry near the specular direction to achieve high surface reflectivity and adequate signal-to-noise ratio. Utilizing a sparse array sharpened the resolution, reduced ambiguity, and showed promise for high-resolution remote sensing of land surfaces.