Vegetation Analysis through L-band Monostatic and Bistatic Measurements from ESA TomoSense Data

Abstract:
ESA TomoSense campaign has provided one of the largest airborne SAR dataset gathered on forested areas. It features opposite views repeat pass acquisitions from two airborne sensors flying in close formation. This configuration allows monostatic and bistatic measurements to be carried out at the same time. Furthermore, C- (5.3GHz) L- (1.375GHz) and P-band (435MHz) measurements was gathered in fully polarimetric mode. SAR data are supported by a number of ancillary products, namely: LiDAR measurements, terrestrial laser scanner mapping and in-situ trees census. In this paper the calibration strategy and the first estimates of the forest parameters at L-band are presented. In addition, a new ad-hoc tomographic algorithm was developed to face the awkward baseline distribution of the bistatic tomographic stack. The description of this approach together with evidences of its effectiveness are shown as well.