The PHARUS Familiarisation Programme

摘要

After the completion of the PHARUS polarimetric phased array SAR, an extensive programme of data acquisition was carried out under the PHARUS Familiarisation Programme, a project for the National Remote Sensing Board (BCRS). The Familiarisation Programme has been aimed at the acquisition of PHARUS data to demonstrate the potential of the PHARUS polarimetric SAR for a number of selected applications to potential users. In order to demonstrate the value of the system for each application, and to familiarise users with PHARUS data, interpretation of the data acquired has been carried out by the users involved in this project. The selected applications were land use classification, cartography in tidal areas, road detection, ocean bottom topography, detection of ships and ship wakes, (moving) target detection, crop classification, forestry applications and precision agriculture. For all these applications data were acquired. The main results are presented. Overall, most applications could be carried out successfully. For some applications, it is clear that more image material is required for a sufficient assessment of the utility of SAR polarimetric data. This is the case for tidal mapping and precision farming, where multi-temporal data is needed. Also, much insight has been gained into the characteristics of the PHARUS system in various modes of operation. Existing calibration procedures needed to be modified in order to calibrate the polarimetric data acquired with the phased array antenna.