Title
RADARSAT-2 and Coastal Applications: Surface Wind, Waterline, and Intertidal Flat Roughness
Abstract
RADARSAT-2 is a follow-up to RADARSAT-1 and is an all weather Earth observation satellite with fully polarimetric imaging capability. The synthetic aperture radars (SARs) onboard both RADARSATs are C-band imaging radars and they are well suited for Earth's ecosystem monitoring and maritime surveillance, because of the near polar orbit and their unique all weather imaging capability, independent of solar illumination. In this paper, RADARSAT-2 is first introduced and several applications of various modes of SAR data to coastal zone problems are discussed, including the coastal surface wind, waterline mapping, and polarimetric SAR data inversion for topographic and geological parameters of tidal flats. Coastal zones, the important interface between the land and the ocean, where a large proportion of the world's population inhabits, continuously change and evolve. The dynamic interaction of coastal winds, coupled with the coastal waves and currents, continuously erode rocks and land mass, and move and deposit various sediments on a continuous basis, along with the tides. Estimation of wind speeds and directions in coastal areas are empirically formulated and can further be improved with the available fully polarimetric data from RADARSAT-2. The water line mapping critically depends on the SAR frequency, or the wavelength of the SAR data used, and RADARSAT-2 SAR data using C-band should map waterlines more accurately than the longer wavelength L- or P-band SAR systems. The roughness parameters and partial information on the tidal flat compositions can be obtained from fully polarimetric SAR data. Some results obtained from NASA AIRSAR(2000) L-band data and RADARSAT-2(2008) C-band data do not fully agree with field measurements and further investigation is in progress. The inversion of polarimetric SAR data is a very complex problem and critically depends on the SAR signal frequency and model functions. RADARSAT-2 is an imaging radar, which is very flexible and powerfu- - l tool for potential coastal zone applications. Key RADARSAT-2 features and potential coastal zone application capabilities are also briefly reviewed.
Year
DOI
Venue
2010
10.1109/JPROC.2010.2043331
Proceedings of the IEEE
Keywords
Field
DocType
geophysical techniques,radar polarimetry,remote sensing by radar,synthetic aperture radar,tides,wind,C-band imaging radars,Earth ecosystem monitoring,L-band SAR systems,P-band SAR systems,RADARSAT-2,all weather Earth observation satellite,coastal currents,coastal surface wind,coastal waves,coastal zone problems,intertidal flat roughness,maritime surveillance,polarimetric SAR data inversion,synthetic aperture radars,waterline mapping,wind speed estimation,Coastal zones,RADARSAT-2,SAR surface wind,intertidal flats,polarimetric SAR,synthetic aperture radar (SAR),waterline
Meteorology,Population,Radar imaging,Wind speed,Polarimetry,Polar orbit,Topographic map,Synthetic aperture radar,Remote sensing,Geology,Waterline
Journal
Volume
Issue
ISSN
98
5
0018-9219
Citations 
PageRank 
References 
2
0.40
10
Authors
5
Name
Order
Citations
PageRank
Wooil M. Moon112919.10
Gordon Staples241.01
Duk-jin Kim311222.63
Sang-Eun Park420124.33
Kyung-Ae Park5107.66