An Advanced Sar For A European Polar Platform

Abstract

The feasibility of a spacebome SAR in C-band using a phased array antenna with active Transmit/Receive modules was demonstrated. An active antenna was selected to enable electronic beam forming while maintaining a good RF/DC power ef6ciency. Further advantages are the avoidance of high power concentrations and high power supplies, and an inherent redundancy in the case of module failures. Orthogonal transmit and receive channels are used, so that horizontally and vertically polarized signals can be transmitted and simultaneously received for polarimetry measurements. This flexible and fully programmable design allows many different modes to be applied. Resolutions from 15 m by 15m (4 looks), swath widths up to 500km, incidence angles between 200 and 500 and polarimetric measurements are possible. Performance requirements can be satisfied within the tight instrument power and mass allocations on the polar platform.