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The growing adoption of electric propulsion systems in Maritime Autonomous Surface Ships (MASSs) necessitates advancements in shipboard electronics for safe, efficient, and reliable operation. These advancements are crucial for tasks such as real-time sensor data processing, control algorithms for autonomous navigation, and robust decision-making capabilities. This study investigates research trends in MASSs, using bibliographic analysis to identify policy and future research directions in this evolving field. We analyze 3363 MASS-related articles from the Web of Science database, employing co-occurrence word analysis and latent Dirichlet allocation (LDA) topic modeling. The findings reveal a rapidly growing field dominated by image recognition research. Keywords such as "datum", "image", and "detection" suggest a focus on collecting and analyzing marine data, particularly with deep learning for synthetic aperture radar imagery. LDA confirms this, with "image analysis and classification research" as the leading topic. The study also identifies national and organizational leaders in MASS research. However, research on Arctic routes lags behind that on other areas. This work provides valuable insights for policymakers and researchers, promoting a deeper understanding of MASSs and informing future policy and research agendas regarding the integration of electric propulsion systems within the maritime industry. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In recent years, with the miniaturization of high-precision position and orientation systems (POS), precise motion errors during SAR data collection can be calculated based on high-precision POS. However, compensating for these errors remains a significant challenge for multi-rotor UAV-borne SAR systems. Compared with large aircrafts, multi-rotor UAVs are lighter, slower, have more complex flight trajectories, and have larger squint angles, which result in significant differences in motion errors between building targets and ground targets. If the motion compensation is based on ground elevation, the motion error of the ground target will be fully compensated, but the building target will still have a large residual error; as a result, although the ground targets can be well-focused, the building targets may be severely defocused. Therefore, it is necessary to further compensate for the residual motion error of building targets based on the actual elevation on the SAR image. However, uncompensated errors will affect the time–frequency relationship; furthermore, the ω-k algorithm will further change these errors, resulting in errors in SAR images becoming even more complex and difficult to compensate for. To solve this problem, this paper proposes a novel improved precise topography and aperture-dependent (PTA) method that can precisely compensate for motion errors in the UAV-borne SAR system. After motion compensation and imaging processing based on ground elevation, a secondary focus is applied to defocused buildings. The improved PTA fully considers the coupling of the residual error with the time–frequency relationship and ω-k algorithm, and the precise errors in the two-dimensional frequency domain are determined through numerical calculations without any approximations. Simulation and actual data processing verify the effectiveness of the method, and the experimental results show that the proposed method in this paper is better than the traditional method. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

For visible and Synthetic Aperture Radar (SAR) image fusion, this paper proposes a visible and SAR image fusion algorithm based on a Transformer and a Convolutional Neural Network (CNN). Firstly, in this paper, the Restormer Block is used to extract cross-modal shallow features. Then, we introduce an improved Transformer–CNN Feature Extractor (TCFE) with a two-branch residual structure. This includes a Transformer branch that introduces the Lite Transformer (LT) and DropKey for extracting global features and a CNN branch that introduces the Convolutional Block Attention Module (CBAM) for extracting local features. Finally, the fused image is output based on global features extracted by the Transformer branch and local features extracted by the CNN branch. The experiments show that the algorithm proposed in this paper can effectively achieve the extraction and fusion of global and local features of visible and SAR images, so that high-quality visible and SAR fusion images can be obtained. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Interferometric synthetic aperture radar (InSAR) and tomographic SAR measurement techniques are commonly used for the three-dimensional (3D) reconstruction of complex areas, while the effectiveness of these methods relies on the interferometric coherence among SAR images with minimal angular disparities. Radargrammetry exploits stereo image matching to determine the spatial coordinates of corresponding points in two SAR images and acquire their 3D properties. The performance of the image matching process directly impacts the quality of the resulting digital surface model (DSM). However, the presence of speckle noise, along with dissimilar geometric and radiometric distortions, poses considerable challenges in achieving accurate stereo SAR image matching. To address these aforementioned challenges, this paper proposes a radargrammetric method based on the composite registration of multi-aspect SAR images. The proposed method combines coarse registration using scale invariant feature transform (SIFT) with precise registration using normalized cross-correlation (NCC) to achieve accurate registration between multi-aspect SAR images with large disparities. Furthermore, the multi-aspect 3D point clouds are merged using the proposed radargrammetric 3D imaging method, resulting in the 3D imaging of target scenes based on multi-aspect SAR images. For validation purposes, this paper presents a comprehensive 3D reconstruction of the Five-hundred-meter Aperture Spherical radio Telescope (FAST) using Ka-band airborne SAR images. It does not necessitate prior knowledge of the target and is applicable to the detailed 3D imaging of large-scale areas with complex structures. In comparison to other SAR 3D imaging techniques, it reduces the requirements for orbit control and radar system parameters. To sum up, the proposed 3D imaging method with composite registration guarantees imaging efficiency, while enhancing the imaging accuracy of crucial areas with limited data. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

High-resolution and high-squint spaceborne spotlight synthetic aperture radar (SAR) has significant potential for extensive application in remote sensing, but its swath width effectiveness is constrained by a critical factor: severe range cell migration (RCM). To address this, pulse repetition interval (PRI) variation offers a practical scheme for raw data reception. However, the current designs for continuously varying PRI (CV-PRI) exhibit high complexity in engineering. In response to the issue, this paper proposes a novel strategy of stepwise varying PRI (SV-PRI), which demonstrates higher reconstruction accuracy compared with CV-PRI. Furthermore, confronting the azimuth non-uniform sampling characteristics induced by the PRI variation, this paper introduces a complete uniform reconstruction processing based on the azimuth partitioning methodology, which effectively alleviates the inherent contradiction between resolution and swath width. The processing flow, utilizing the temporal point remapping (TPR) concept, ensures the uniformity and coherence of dataset partitioning and reassembly in the context of the interpolation on non-uniform grids. Finally, according to the simulation results, the point target data, processed through the processing flow proposed in this study, have demonstrated effective focusing results. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This document explores the significance of remote sensing in monitoring maritime activities and identifying vessels. It emphasizes the need for surveillance to ensure safety, security, and emergency management, given the increasing number of vessels worldwide. The document highlights the use of technologies like the Automatic Identification System (AIS) and remote sensing in situations where collaborative systems are not reliable. It also discusses the integration of data from different sensors and the application of data science techniques for a comprehensive assessment of maritime traffic. The document concludes by summarizing research papers on ship detection, tracking, and classification using various sensors and data processing techniques. [Extracted from the article]

Generative adversarial networks (or GANs) are a specific deep learning architecture often used for different usages, such as data generation or image-to-image translation. In recent years, this structure has gained increased popularity and has been used in different fields. One area of expertise currently in vogue is the use of GANs to produce synthetic aperture radar (SAR) data, and especially expand training datasets for SAR automatic target recognition (ATR). In effect, the complex SAR image formation makes these kind of data rich in information, leading to the use of deep networks in deep learning-based methods. Yet, deep networks also require sufficient data for training. However, contrary to optical images, we generally do not have a substantial number of available SAR images because of their acquisition and labelling cost; GANs are then an interesting tool. Concurrently, how to improve explainability for SAR ATR deep neural networks and how to make their reasoning more transparent have been increasingly explored as model opacity deteriorates trust of users. This paper aims at reviewing how GANs are used with SAR images, but also giving perspectives on how GANs could be used to improve interpretability and explainability of SAR classifiers. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Distributed interrupted sampling repeater jamming (D-ISRJ) is the application of interrupted sampling repeater jamming technology within the framework of distributed jamming systems. It can generate coherent false targets after passing through the target radar's matched filter, but these false targets exhibit strong regularity in range and amplitude. Addressing this issue, a distributed interrupted sampling frequency-shifted repeater jamming method based on the group teaching optimization algorithm (GTOA) is proposed in this paper. By introducing frequency-shifted modulation during the retransmission of the jamming signal, the frequency shift amount of the jamming unit in each round of repeater jamming is used as an optimization variable to construct an optimization model for distributed interrupted sampling frequency-shifted repeater jamming. The parameters are then solved by using GTOA. Simulations are conducted to analyze the jamming effects under different distributed jamming modes, and the proposed optimization algorithm is compared to common swarm intelligence algorithms in the same optimization model. The method proposed in this paper can be used in the field of precision electronic warfare to improve the jamming effect of synthetic aperture radar. Experimental results show that under the given simulation conditions, the jamming signal generated by the proposed method can achieve better jamming effects. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Near-range radar imaging (NRRI) has evolved into a vital technology with diverse applications spanning fields such as remote sensing, surveillance, medical imaging and non-destructive testing. The Pseudopolar Format Matrix (PFM) has emerged as a promising technique for representing radar data in a compact and efficient manner. In this paper, we present a comprehensive PFM description of near-range radar imaging. Furthermore, this paper also explores the integration of the Fractional Fourier Transform (FrFT) with PFM for enhanced radar signal analysis. The FrFT—a powerful mathematical tool for signal processing—offers unique capabilities in analysing signals with time-frequency localization properties. By combining FrFT with PFM, we have achieved significant advancements in radar imaging, particularly in dealing with complex clutter environments and improving target detection accuracy. Meanwhile, this paper highlights the imaging matrix form of FrFT under the PFM, emphasizing the potential for addressing challenges encountered in near-range radar imaging. Finally, numerical simulation and real-world scenario measurement imaging results verify optimized accuracy and computational efficiency with the fusion of PFM and FrFT techniques, paving the way for further innovations in near-range radar imaging applications. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Time series dynamic prediction of surface deformation in mining areas can provide reference data for coal mine safety and production, which has important impacts. The combination of interferometric synthetic aperture radar (InSAR) technology and the probability integral method (PIM) is commonly used for predicting deformation. However, most surface subsidence prediction in mining areas is based on the static PIM parameters, failing to achieve the three-dimensional (3D) dynamic deformation prediction. This paper proposed a 3D deformation dynamic prediction model (InSAR-3D-CTPIM) between InSAR deformation observations and dynamic coordinate-time PIM (CTPIM) parameters, which can realize the prediction of east–west, north–south, and vertical series deformation caused by mining. The method has been validated by simulation experiments and real experiments in the mining area of Jiansheng Coal Mine in Baisha Reservoir, Henan Province, China. The results showed that the modeling accuracy was improved by 34.3% compared to the traditional multi-rate model, and the accuracy was improved by 28.5% compared to the vertical deformation obtained by the traditional static PIM method. The InSAR-3D-CTPIM model can be used to predict the evolutionary history of basin-wide surface deformation dynamics in coal mining areas, and provide a reference for the early warning and prediction of geological hazards in coal mining areas. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Forest biomass estimation is undoubtedly one of the most pressing research subjects at present. Combining multi-source remote sensing information can give full play to the advantages of different remote sensing technologies, providing more comprehensive and rich information for aboveground biomass (AGB) estimation research. Based on Landsat 8, Sentinel-2A, and ALOS2 PALSAR data, this paper takes the artificial coniferous forests in the Saihanba Forest of Hebei Province as the object of study, fully explores and establishes remote sensing factors and information related to forest structure, gives full play to the advantages of spectral signals in detecting the horizontal structure and multi-dimensional synthetic aperture radar (SAR) data in detecting the vertical structure, and combines environmental factors to carry out multivariate synergistic methods of estimating the AGB. This paper uses three variable selection methods (Pearson correlation coefficient, random forest significance, and the least absolute shrinkage and selection operator (LASSO)) to establish the variable sets, combining them with three typical non-parametric models to estimate AGB, namely, random forest (RF), support vector regression (SVR), and artificial neural network (ANN), to analyze the effect of forest structure on biomass estimation, explore the suitable AGB of artificial coniferous forests estimation of machine learning models, and develop the method of quantifying saturation value of the combined variables. The results show that the horizontal structure is more capable of explaining the AGB compared to the vertical structure information, and that combining the multi-structure information can improve the model results and the saturation value to a great extent. In this study, different sets of variables can produce relatively superior results in different models. The variable set selected using LASSO gives the best results in the SVR model, with an R 2 values of 0.9998 and 0.8792 for the training and the test set, respectively, and the highest saturation value obtained is 185.73 t/ha, which is beyond the range of the measured data. The problem of saturation in biomass estimation in boreal medium- and high-density forests was overcome to a certain extent, and the AGB of the Saihanba area was better estimated. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In recent years, deep learning has found widespread application in SAR image object detection. However, when detecting multi-scale targets against complex backgrounds, these models often struggle to strike a balance between accuracy and speed. Furthermore, there is a continuous need to enhance the performance of current models. Hence, this paper proposes LRMSNet, a new multi-scale target detection model designed specifically for SAR images in complex backgrounds. Firstly, the paper introduces an attention module designed to enhance contextual information aggregation and capture global features, which is integrated into a backbone network with an expanded receptive field for improving SAR image feature extraction. Secondly, this paper develops an information aggregation module to effectively fuse different feature layers of the backbone network. Lastly, to better integrate feature information at various levels, this paper designs a multi-scale aggregation network. We validate the effectiveness of our method on three different SAR object detection datasets (MSAR-1.0, SSDD, and HRSID). Experimental results demonstrate that LRMSNet achieves outstanding performance with a mean average accuracy (mAP) of 95.2%, 98.9%, and 93.3% on the MSAR-1.0, SSDD, and HRSID datasets, respectively, with only 3.46 M parameters and 12.6 G floating-point operation cost (FLOPs). When compared with existing SAR object detection models on the MSAR-1.0 dataset, LRMSNet achieves state-of-the-art (SOTA) performance, showcasing its superiority in addressing SAR detection challenges in large-scale complex environments and across various object scales. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The PIESAT-01 constellation is the world's first multi-baseline distributed synthetic aperture radar (SAR) constellation with a "Cartwheel" formation. The "Cartwheel" formation is a unique formation in which four satellites fly in companion orbits, ensuring that at any given moment, the main satellite remains at the center, with three auxiliary satellites orbiting around it. Due to this unique configuration of the PIESAT-01 constellation, four images of the same region and six pairs of baselines can be obtained with each shot. So far, there has been no imaging and interference research based on four-satellite constellation measured data, and there is an urgent need to explore algorithms for the "Cartwheel" configuration imaging and digital surface model (DSM) production. This paper introduces an improved bistatic SAR imaging algorithm under the four-satellites interferometric mode, which solves the problem of multi-orbit nonparallelism in imaging while ensuring imaging coherence and focusing ability. Subsequently, it presents an interferometric processing method for the six pairs of baselines, weighted fusion based on elevation ambiguity from different baselines, to obtain a high-precision DSM. Finally, this paper selects the Dingxi region of China and other regions with diverse terrains for imaging and DSM production and compares the DSM results with ICESat-2 global geolocated photon data and TanDEM DSM data. The results indicate that the accuracy of PIESAT-01 DSM meets the standards of China's 1:50,000 scale and HRTI-3, demonstrating a high level of precision. Moreover, PIESAT-01 data alleviate the reliance on simulated data for research on multi-baseline imaging and multi-baseline phase unwrapping algorithms and can provide more effective and realistic measured data. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Phase unwrapping of high phase noise and steep phase gradient has always been a challenging problem in interferometric synthetic aperture radar (InSAR), in which case the least squares (LS) phase unwrapping method often suffers from significant unwrapping errors. Therefore, this paper proposes an improved LS phase unwrapping method based on the Chebyshev filter, which solves the problem of incomplete unwrapping and errors under high phase noise and steep phase gradient. Firstly, the steep gradient phase is transformed into multiple flat gradient phases using the Chebyshev filter. Then the flat gradient phases are unwrapped using the LS unwrapping method. Finally, the final unwrapped phase is obtained by iteratively adding the unwrapping results of the flat gradient phases. The simulation results show that the proposed method has the best accuracy and stability compared to LS, PCUA, and RPUA. In the real InSAR phase unwrapping experiment, the RMSE of the proposed method is reduced by 63.91%, 35.38%, and 54.39% compared to LS, PCUA, and RPUA. The phase unwrapping time is reduced by 62.86% and 11.64% compared to PCUA and RPUA. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

For synthetic aperture microwave radiometers, the problem of Radio Frequency Interference (RFI) is becoming more and more serious, which affects both the scientific retrieval of remote sensing data and the imaging quality of brightness temperature (BT) images. In the visibility data domain, the array factor synthesis algorithm is commonly employed to mitigate RFI sources and their Gibbs trailing. In the BT image domain, the CLEAN algorithm is typical applied to mitigate RFI sources and their Gibbs trailing. However, the array factor synthesis algorithm can result in anomalous BT points near the "zero trap" region, and the CLEAN algorithm will miss some BT points below a certain threshold. In this paper, a Bi-domain combined mitigation algorithm is proposed to mitigate RFI sources and their Gibbs trailing. Following initial mitigation in the visibility data domain, dual thresholds are applied to normalize anomalous BT points near the "zero trap" region, thereby enhancing imaging quality. The effectiveness of the Bi-domain combined mitigation algorithm is verified by using both measured data from SMOS L1A and simulated data. The experimental results demonstrate that the Bi-domain combined mitigation algorithm is superior to the array factor synthesis algorithm and the CLEAN algorithm in mitigating RFI sources and their Gibbs trailing. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

When Synthetic Aperture Radar (SAR) observes complex structural targets such as oil tanks, it is easily interfered with by multipath signals, resulting in a large number of multipath ghost images in the SAR image, which seriously affect the image clarity. To address this problem, this paper proposes a multi-aspect multipath suppression method. This method observes complex structural targets from different azimuth angles to obtain a multi-aspect image sequence and then uses the difference in sequence features between the target image and the multipath ghost image with respect to aspect angle to separate them. This paper takes a floating-roof oil tank as an example to analyze the propagation path and the ghost image characteristics of multipath signals under different observation aspects. We conclude that the scattering center of the multipath ghost image changes with the radar observation aspect, whereas the scattering center of the target image does not. This paper uses the Robust Principal Component Analysis (RPCA) method to decompose the image sequence matrix into two parts: a sparse matrix and a low-rank matrix. The low-rank matrix represents the aspect-stable principal component in the image sequence; that is, the real scattering center. The sparse matrix represents the part of the image sequence that deviates from the principal component; that is, the signal that varies with aspect, mainly including multipath signals, sidelobes, anisotropic signals, etc. By reconstructing the low-rank matrix and the sparse matrix, respectively, we can obtain the image after multipath signal suppression and also the multipath ghost image. Both the target and the multipath signal provide useful information. The image after multipath signal suppression is useful for obtaining the structural information of the target, and the multipath ghost image is useful for analyzing the multipath phenomenon of the complex structure target. This paper conducts experimental verification using real airborne SAR data of an external floating roof oil tank and compares three methods: RPCA, PCA, and sub-aperture fusion method. The experiment shows that the RPCA method can better separate the target image and the multipath ghost image. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Circular synthetic aperture radar (CSAR) possesses the capability of multi-angle observation, breaking through the geometric observation constraints of traditional strip SAR and holding the potential for three-dimensional imaging. Its sub-wavelength level of planar resolution, resulting from a long synthetic aperture, makes CSAR highly valuable in the field of high-precision mapping. However, the motion geometry of CSAR is more intricate compared to traditional strip SAR, demanding high precision from navigation systems. The accumulation of errors over the long synthetic aperture time cannot be overlooked. CSAR exhibits significant coupling between the range and azimuth directions, making traditional motion compensation methods based on linear SAR unsuitable for direct application in CSAR. The dynamic nature of flight, with its continuous changes in attitude, introduces a significant deformation error between the non-rigidly connected Inertial Measurement Unit (IMU) and the Global Positioning System (GPS). This deformation error makes it difficult to accurately obtain radar position information, resulting in imaging defocus. The research in this article uncovers a correlation between the deformation error and radial acceleration. Leveraging this insight, we propose utilizing radial acceleration to estimate residual motion errors. This paper delves into the analysis of Position and Orientation System (POS) errors, presenting a novel high-resolution CSAR motion compensation method based on airborne platform acceleration information. Once the system deformation parameters are calibrated using point targets, the deformation error can be directly calculated and compensated based on the acceleration information, ultimately resulting in the generation of a high-resolution image. In this paper, the effectiveness of the method is verified with airborne flight test data. This method can compensate for the deformation error and effectively improve the peak sidelobe ratio and integral sidelobe ratio of the target, thus improving image quality. The introduction of acceleration information provides new means and methods for high-resolution CSAR imaging. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper investigates a real-time process generator of wideband signals, which calculates waveforms in a field-programmable gate array (FPGA) using the high-level synthesis (HLS) method. To obtain high-resolution and wide-swath images, the generator must produce multiple modes of large time-bandwidth product (TBP) linear frequency modulation (LFM) signals. However, the conventional storage method is unrealistic as it requires huge storage resources to save pre-computed waveforms. Therefore, this paper proposes a novel processing approach that calculates waveforms in real-time based simply on parameters such as the sampling frequency, bandwidth, and time width. Additionally, this paper implements predistortion through the polynomial curve to approximate phase errors of the system. The parallelizing process in the FPGA is necessary to satisfy the high-speed requirement of a digital-to-analog converter (DAC); however, repeatedly multiplexing real-time calculation consumes extensive logic and DSP resources, potentially exceeding FPGA limitations. To address this, this paper proposes a piecewise linear algorithm to conserve resources, which processes the polynomial only once, acquires the difference in two adjacent values through the register and pipeline, and then adds this increment to facilitate parallel computations. The performance of this proposed generator is validated through simulation and implemented in experiments with an X-band airborne SAR system. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

With the number of new satellites increasing dramatically, comprehensive space surveillance is becoming increasingly important. Therefore, high-resolution inverse synthetic aperture radar (ISAR) imaging of satellites can provide an in-situ assessment of the satellites. This paper demonstrates that pseudo-noise signals can also be used for satellite imaging, in addition to classical linear frequency-modulated chirp signals. Pseudo-noise transmission signals offer the advantage of very low cross-correlation values. This, for instance, enables the possibility of a system with multiple channels transmitting instantaneously. Furthermore, it can significantly reduce signal interference with other systems operating in the same frequency spectrum, which is of particular interest for high-bandwidth, high-power systems such as satellite imaging radars. A new routine has been introduced to generate a wideband pseudo-noise signal with a peak-to-average power ratio (PAPR) similar to that of a chirp signal. This is essential for applications where the transmit signal power budget is sharply limited by the high-power amplifier. The paper presents both theoretical descriptions and analysis of the generated pseudo-noise signal as well as the results of an imaging measurement of a real space target using the introduced pseudo-noise signals. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Synthetic aperture radar tomography (TomoSAR) is an extension of synthetic aperture radar (SAR) imaging. It introduces the synthetic aperture principle into the elevation direction to achieve three-dimensional (3-D) reconstruction of the observed target. Compressive sensing (CS) is a favorable technology for sparse elevation recovery. However, for the non-sparse elevation distribution of the forested areas, if CS is selected to reconstruct it, it is necessary to utilize some orthogonal bases to first represent the elevation reflectivity sparsely. The iterative adaptive approach (IAA) is a non-parametric algorithm that enables super-resolution reconstruction with minimal snapshots, eliminates the need for hyperparameter optimization, and requires fewer iterations. This paper introduces IAA to tomographicinversion of the forested areas and proposes a novel multi-polarimetric-channel joint 3-D imaging method. The proposed method relies on the characteristics of the consistent support of the elevation distribution of different polarimetric channels and uses the L 2 -norm to constrain the IAA-based 3-D reconstruction of each polarimetric channel. Compared with typical spectral estimation (SE)-based algorithms, the proposed method suppresses the elevation sidelobes and ambiguity and, hence, improves the quality of the recovered 3-D image. Compared with the wavelet-based CS algorithm, it reduces computational cost and avoids the influence of orthogonal basis selection. In addition, in comparison to the IAA, it demonstrates greater accuracy in identifying the support of the elevation distribution in forested areas. Experimental results based on BioSAR 2008 data are used to validate the proposed method. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Fast factorized back-projection (FFBP) is a classical fast time-domain technique that has garnered significant success in spotlight synthetic aperture radar (SAR) signal processing. The algorithm's efficiency has been extended to stripmap SAR through integral aperture determination and full-aperture data block processing while retaining its computational efficiency. However, the above method is only operated in the azimuth direction, and the computing efficiency needs to be urgently improved in the actual processing process. This paper proposes a fast factorized back-projection algorithm for stripmap SAR imaging based on range block division. The echo data are divided into multiple subblocks in the range direction, and FFBP processing is applied separately to each full-aperture subblock, further enhancing computational efficiency. The paper analyzes the algorithm's principles, underscores the necessity of integral aperture determination and full-aperture data block processing, provides specific implementation steps, and applies the algorithm to point target simulation and experimental data from a vehicle-mounted ice radar. The experiments validate the algorithm's efficiency in stripmap SAR imaging. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Dedicated to synchronously acquiring large-area, high-precision, and multi-scale ocean wind and wave information, a novel concept of a spaceborne ocean microwave dual-function integrated sensor is proposed in this paper. It integrates the functions of a scatterometer and SAR by sharing a single phased-array antenna. An overview of the scientific requirements and motivations for the sensor are outlined firstly. In order to fulfill the observation requirements of both the functions, the constraints on the system parameters such as frequency, antenna size, and incidence angle are analyzed. Then, the selection principles of these parameters are discussed within the limitations of antenna area, bandwidth, available time, and cost. Additionally, the constraints on the time sequence of transmitting and receiving pulses are derived to ensure that there is no conflict when the two functions operate simultaneously. Subsequently, a method for jointly designing the pulse repetition frequency (PRF) of both the functions is introduced, along with zebra maps to verify its effectiveness. At the end of the paper, the system and performance parameters of the sensor are given for further insight into it. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Many fields of human activity benefit from the ability to create images of obscured objects placed behind walls and to map their displacement in a noninvasive way. Usually, imaging devices like Synthetic Aperture Radars (SARs) and Ground-Penetrating Radars (GPRs) use expensive dedicated electronics which results in prohibitive prices. This paper presents the experimental implementation and the results obtained from an imaging system capable of performing SAR imaging and interferometric displacement mapping of targets located behind walls, as well as 3D GPR imaging using a low-cost general-purpose radar sensor. The proposed solution uses for the RF section of the system a K-band microwave radar sensor module implementing Frequency-Modulated Continuous Wave (FMCW) operation. The low-cost sensor was originally intended for simple presence detection and ranging for domestic applications. The proposed system was tested in several scenarios and proved to operate as intended for a fraction of the cost of a commercial imaging device. In one scenario, it was able to detect and locate a 15 cm-diameter fire-extinguisher located at a distance of 3.5 m from the scanning system and 1.6 m behind a 3 cm-thick MDF (medium-density fiberboard) wall with cm-level accuracy. In a second test, the proposed system was used to perform interferometric displacement measurements, and it was capable of determining the displacement of a metal case with sub-millimeter accuracy. In a third experiment, the system was used to construct a 3D image of the inside of a wood table with cm-level resolution. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The stability of loess landslides affects the production and livelihood of the people in its vicinity. The stability of loess landslides is influenced by various factors, including internal structure, collapsibility, water content, and shear strength. The landslide stability of loesses can be analyzed by several geophysical methods, such as seismic refraction tomography (SRT), electrical resistivity tomography (ERT), micro-seismic technology, and ground penetrating radar (GPR). Geotechnical tests (compression and shear tests) and remote sensing techniques (Global Navigation Satellite System (GNSS), Interferometric Synthetic Aperture Radar (InSAR) and airborne 3D laser technology) are used for studying the landslide stability of loesses as well. Some of the methods above can measure parameters (e.g., fractures, water content, shear strength, creep) which influence the stability of loess landslides, while other methods qualitatively indicate the influencing factors. Integrating parameters measured by different methods, minimizing disturbances to landslides, and assessing landslide stability are important steps in studying landslide hazards. This paper comprehensively introduces the methods used in recent studies on the landslide stability of loesses and summarizes the factors which affect the landslide stability. Furthermore, the relationships between different parameters and methods are examined. This paper enhances comprehension of the underlying mechanisms of the stability of loess landslides to diminish disastrous consequences. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper introduces a method for quantifying the three-dimensional deformation of ground targets and outlines the associated process. Initially, ground-based synthetic aperture radar was employed to monitor the radial deformation of targets, and optical equipment monitored pixel-level deformation in the vertical plane of the line of sight. Subsequently, a regression model was established to transform pixel-level deformation into two-dimensional deformation based on a fundamental length unit, and the radar deformation monitoring data were merged with the optical deformation monitoring data. Finally, the fused data underwent deformation, resulting in a comprehensive three-dimensional deformation profile of the target. Through physical data acquisition experiments, the comprehensive three-dimensional deformation of targets was obtained and compared with the actual deformations. The experimental results show that the method has a relative error of less than 10%, and monitoring accuracy is achieved at the millimeter level. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

As artificial intelligence technology advances, the application of object detection technology in the field of SAR (synthetic aperture radar) imagery is becoming increasingly widespread. However, it also faces challenges such as resource limitations in spaceborne environments and significant uncertainty in the intensity of interference in application scenarios. These factors make the performance evaluation of object detection key to ensuring the smooth execution of tasks. In the face of such complex and harsh application scenarios, methods that rely on single-dimensional evaluation to assess models have had their limitations highlighted. Therefore, this paper proposes a multi-dimensional evaluation method for deep learning models used in SAR image object detection. This method evaluates models in a multi-dimensional manner, covering the training, testing, and application stages of the model, and constructs a multi-dimensional evaluation index system. The training stage includes assessing training efficiency and the impact of training samples; the testing stage includes model performance evaluation, application-based evaluation, and task-based evaluation; and the application stage includes model operation evaluation and model deployment evaluation. The evaluations of these three stages constitute the key links in the performance evaluation of deep learning models. Furthermore, this paper proposes a multi-indicator comprehensive evaluation method based on entropy weight correlation scaling, which calculates the weights of each evaluation indicator through test data, thereby providing a balanced and comprehensive evaluation mechanism for model performance. In the experiments, we designed specific interferences for SAR images in the testing stage and tested three models from the YOLO series. Finally, we constructed a multi-dimensional performance profile diagram for deep learning object detection models, providing a new visualization method to comprehensively characterize model performance in complex application scenarios. This can provide more accurate and comprehensive model performance evaluation for remote sensing data processing, thereby guiding model selection and optimization. The evaluation method proposed in this study adopts a multi-dimensional perspective, comprehensively assessing the three core stages of a model's lifecycle: training, testing, and application. This framework demonstrates significant versatility and adaptability, enabling it to transcend the boundaries of remote sensing technology and provide support for a wide range of model evaluation and optimization tasks. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Nearshore ship detection has significant applications in both the military and civilian domains. Compared to synthetic aperture radar (SAR), polarimetric synthetic aperture radar (PolSAR) provides richer information for analyzing the scattering mechanisms of ships and enables better detection of ship targets. However, ships in nearshore areas tend to be highly concentrated, and ship detection is often affected by adjacent strong scattering, resulting in false alarms or missed detections. While the GP-PNF detector performs well in PolSAR ship detection, it cannot obtain satisfactory results in these scenarios, and it also struggles in the presence of azimuthal ambiguity or strong clutter interference. To address these challenges, we propose a nearshore ship detection method named ECD-PNF by integrating superpixel-level GP-PNF and refined polarimetric decomposition. Firstly, polarimetric superpixel segmentation and sea–land segmentation are performed to reduce the influence of land on ship detection. To estimate the sea clutter more accurately, an automatic censoring (AC) mechanism combined with superpixels is used to select the sea clutter superpixels. By utilizing refined eight-component polarimetric decomposition to improve the scattering vector, the physical interpretability of the detector is enhanced. Additionally, the expression of polarimetric coherence is improved to enhance the target clutter ratio (TCR). Finally, this paper combines the third eigenvalue of eigenvalue–eigenvector decomposition to reduce the impact of azimuthal ambiguity. Three spaceborne PolSAR datasets from Radarsat-2 and GF-3 are adopted in the experiments for comparison. The proposed ECD-PNF method achieves the highest figure of merit (FoM) value of 0.980, 1.000, and 1.000 for three datasets, validating the effectiveness of the proposed method. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Synthetic Aperture Radar (SAR) is a high-resolution imaging sensor commonly mounted on platforms such as airplanes and satellites for widespread use. In complex electromagnetic environments, radio frequency interference (RFI) severely degrades the quality of SAR images due to its widely varying bandwidth and numerous unknown emission sources. Although traditional deep learning-based methods have achieved remarkable results by directly processing SAR images as visual ones, there is still considerable room for improvement in their performance due to the wide coverage and high intensity of RFI. To address these issues, this paper proposes the fusion of segmentation and inpainting networks (FuSINet) to suppress SAR RFI in the time-frequency domain. Firstly, to weaken the dominance of RFI in SAR images caused by high-intensity interference, a simple CCN-based network is employed to learn and segment the RFI. This results in the removal of most of the original interference, leaving blanks that allow the targets to regain dominance in the overall image. Secondly, considering the wide coverage characteristic of RFI, a U-former network with global information capture capabilities is utilized to learn the content covered by the interference and fill in the blanks created by the segmentation network. Compared to the traditional Transformer, this paper enhances its global information capture capabilities through shift-windows and down-sampling layers. Finally, the segmentation and inpainting networks are fused together through a weighted parameter for joint training. This not only accelerates the learning speed but also enables better coordination between the two networks, leading to improved RFI suppression performance. Extensive experimental results demonstrate the substantial performance enhancement of the proposed FuSINet. Compared to the PISNet+, the proposed attention mechanism achieves a 2.49 dB improvement in peak signal-to-noise ratio (PSNR). Furthermore, compared to Uformer, the FuSINet achieves an additional 4.16 dB improvement in PSNR. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper presents a method for extracting the digital elevation model (DEM) of forested areas from polarimetric interferometric synthetic aperture radar (PolInSAR) data. The method models the ground phase as a Von Mises distribution, with a mean of the topographic phase computed from an external DEM. By combining the prior distribution of the ground phase with the complex Wishart distribution of the observation covariance matrix, we derive the maximum a posterior (MAP) inversion method based on the RVoG model and analyze its Cramer–Rao Lower Bound (CRLB). Furthermore, considering the characteristics of the objective function, this paper introduces a Four-Step Optimization (FSO) method based on gradient optimization, which solves the inefficiency problem caused by exhaustive search in solving ground phase using the MAP method. The method is validated using spaceborne L-band repeat-pass SAOCOM data from a test forest area. The test results for FSO indicate that it is approximately 5.6 times faster than traditional methods without compromising accuracy. Simultaneously, the experimental results demonstrate that the method effectively solves the problem of elevation jumps in DEM inversion when modeling the ground phase with the Gaussian distribution. ICESAT-2 data are used to evaluate the accuracy of the inverted DEM, revealing that our method improves the root mean square error (RMSE) by about 23.6% compared to the traditional methods. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper presents a forward modeling method for the scattering center (SC) model of dynamic ships on time-varying sea surfaces, tailored for remote sensing and target-recognition applications. Grounded in ship hydrodynamics, the methodology delineates ship movements amidst fluctuating waves, harnessing computer graphics to integrate ship–sea geometries across diverse temporal instances. Utilizing the four-path model, the composite scattering effects are segregated into distinct ship and sea contributions, along with their mutual interactions. Augmented by high-frequency electromagnetic principles, the paper quantifies and deduces SC parameters, culminating in a 3-D parameterized SC model for complex maritime targets. Unlike conventional inverse methods, this approach employs a "cause-to-effect" forward strategy, establishing clear links between SCs and local geometries, enhancing the model's physical clarity. Using the fishing ship as a case, this research compared the normalized similarity index and position-matching rate between the reconstructed synthetic aperture radar (SAR) image and the simulated SAR image. The results indicate that all computed results exceeded 90%. Furthermore, a comparison was conducted between the reconstructed radar cross-sections (RCS) obtained by expanding the model within a large angular range and the simulated results. The root mean square error between the two was less than 3 dB, affirming the accuracy and effectiveness of the proposed model. Additionally, the research examines the variations in SCs during the six-degrees-of-freedom motions, providing a detailed quantitative analysis of their temporal trends in amplitude and position. In summary, this investigation furnishes an efficient and economical framework for rapid radar characterization in dynamic, variable marine environments, fostering advancements in remote sensing and maritime target identification. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Polar format algorithm (PFA) is a widely used high-resolution SAR imaging algorithm that can be implemented in advanced widefield staring synthetic aperture radar (WFS-SAR). However, existing algorithms have limited analysis in wavefront curvature error (WCE) and are challenging to apply to WFS-SAR with high-resolution and large-swath scenes. This paper proposes an extended polar format algorithm for joint envelope and phase error correction in WFS-SAR imaging with maneuvering trajectory. The impact of the WCE and residual acceleration error (RAE) are analyzed in detail by deriving the specific wavenumber domain signal based on the mapping relationship between the geometry space and wavenumber space. Subsequently, this paper improves the traditional WCE compensation function and introduces a new range cell migration (RCM) recalibration function for joint envelope and phase error correction. The 2D precisely focused SAR image is acquired based on the spatially variant inverse filtering in the final. Simulation experiments validate the effectiveness of the proposed method. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Landslides are a common geological disaster, which cause many economic losses and casualties in the world each year. Drawing up a landslide list and monitoring their deformations is crucial to prevent landslide disasters. Interferometric synthetic aperture radar (InSAR) can obtain millimeter-level surface deformations and provide data support for landslide deformation monitoring. However, some landslides are difficult to detect due to the low-coherence caused by vegetation cover in mountainous areas and the difficulty of phase unwrapping caused by large landslide deformations. In this paper, a method based on multi-direction phase gradient stacking is proposed. It employs the differential interferograms of small baseline sets to directly obtain the abnormal region, thereby avoiding the problem where part of landslide cannot be detected due to a phase unwrapping error. In this study, the Sentinel-1 satellite ascending and descending data from 2018 to 2020 are used to detect landslides around Zhouqu County, China. A total of 26 active landslides were detected in ascending data and 32 active landslides in the descending data using the method in this paper, while the SBAS-InSAR detected 19 active landslides in the ascending data and 25 active landslides in the descending data. The method in this paper can successfully detect landslides in areas that are difficult for the SBAS-InSAR to detect. In addition, the proposed method does not require phase unwrapping, so a significant amount of data processing time can be saved. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper addresses the challenge of extracting feature points and image matching in Synthetic Aperture Radar (SAR) satellite images, particularly focusing on large-scale embedding. The widely used Scale Invariant Transform (SIFT) algorithm, successful in computer vision and optical satellite image matching, faces challenges when applied to satellite SAR images due to the presence of speckle noise, leading to increased matching errors. The SAR–SIFT method is explored and analyzed in-depth, considering the unique characteristics of satellite SAR images. To enhance the efficiency of matching identical feature points in two satellite SAR images, the paper proposes a Graphics Processing Unit (GPU) mapping implementation based on the SAR–SIFT algorithm. The paper introduces a multi-GPU collaborative acceleration strategy for SAR image matching. This strategy addresses the challenge of matching feature points in the region and embedding multiple SAR images in large areas. The goal is to achieve efficient matching processing of multiple SAR images in extensive geographical regions. The proposed multi-GPU collaborative acceleration algorithm is validated through experiments involving feature point extraction and matching using 21 GF-3 SAR images. The results demonstrate the feasibility and efficiency of the algorithm in enhancing the processing speed of matching feature points in large-scale satellite SAR images. Overall, the paper contributes to the advancement of SAR image processing techniques, specifically in feature point extraction and matching in large-scale applications. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

As urban economies flourish and populations become increasingly concentrated, urban surface deformation has emerged as a critical factor in city planning that cannot be overlooked. Surface deformation in urban areas can lead to deformations in structural supports of infrastructure such as road bases and bridges, thereby posing a serious threat to public safety and creating significant safety hazards. Consequently, research focusing on the monitoring of urban surface deformation holds paramount importance. Interferometric synthetic aperture radar (InSAR), as an important means of earth observation, has all-day, wide-range, high-precision, etc., characteristics and is widely used in the field of surface deformation monitoring. However, traditional solitary InSAR techniques are limited in their application scenarios and computational characteristics. Additionally, the manual selection of ground control points (GCPs) is fraught with errors and uncertainties. Permanent scatterers (PS) can maintain high interferometric coherence in man-made building areas, and distributed scatterers (DS) usually show moderate coherence in areas with short vegetation; the combination of DS and PS solves the problem of manually selecting GCPs during track re-flattening and regrading, which affects the monitoring results. In this paper, 45 Sentinel-1B data from 16 February 2019 to 14 December 2021 are used as the data source in the urban area of Horqin District, Tongliao City, Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region, for example. A four-threshold (coherence coefficient threshold, FaSHPS adaptive threshold, amplitude divergence index threshold, and deformation velocity interval) GCPs point screening method for PS-DS, as well as a Small Baseline Subset-Permanent Scatterers-Distributed Scatterers-Interferometric Synthetic Aperture Radar (SBAS-PS-DS-InSAR) method for selecting PS and DS points as ground control points for orbit refinement and re-flattening, are proposed. The surface deformation results obtained using the Small Baseline Subset Interferometric Synthetic Aperture Radar (SBAS-InSAR) and the SBAS-PS-DS-InSAR proposed in this paper were comparatively analysed and verified. The maximum cumulative line-of-sight settlements were −90.78 mm and −83.68 mm, and the maximum cumulative uplifts are 74.94 mm and 97.56 mm, respectively; the maximum annual average line-of-sight settlements are −35.38 mm/y and −30.38 mm/y, and the maximum annual average uplifts are 25.27 mm/y and 27.92 mm/y. The results were evaluated and analysed in terms of correlation, mean absolute error (MAE), and root mean square error (RMSE). The deformation results of the two InSAR methods were evaluated and analysed in terms of correlation, MAE, and RMSE. The errors show that the Pearson correlation coefficients between the vertical settlement results obtained using the SBAS-PS-DS-InSAR method and the GPS monitoring results were closer to 1. The maximum MAE and RMSE were 13.7625 mm and 14.8004 mm, respectively, which are within the acceptable range; this confirms that the monitoring results of the SBAS-PS-DS-InSAR method were better than those of the original SBAS-InSAR method. SBAS-InSAR method, which is valid and reliable. The results show that the surface deformation results obtained using the SBAS-InSAR, SBAS-PS-DS-InSAR, and GPS methods have basically the same settlement locations, extents, distributions, and temporal and spatial settlement patterns. The deformation results obtained using these two InSAR methods correlate well with the GPS monitoring results, and the MAE and RMSE are within acceptable limits. By comparing the deformation information obtained using multiple methods, the surface deformation in urban areas can be better monitored and analysed, and it can also provide scientific references for urban municipal planning and disaster warning. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

As miniaturization technology has progressed, Synthetic Aperture Radar (SAR) can now be mounted on Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs) to carry out observational tasks. Influenced by airflow, UAVs inevitably experience deviations or vibrations during flight. In the context of cost constraints, the precision of the measurement equipment onboard UAVs may be relatively low. Nonetheless, high-resolution imaging demands more accurate track information. It is therefore of great importance to estimate high-precision tracks in the presence of both motion and measurement errors. This paper presents a robust track estimation method for airborne SAR that makes use of both envelope and phase errors. Firstly, weak navigation information is employed for motion compensation, which reduces a significant portion of the motion error. Subsequently, the track is initially estimated using additional envelope errors introduced by the Extended Omega-K (EOK) algorithm. The track is then refined using a phase-based approach. Furthermore, this paper presents the calculation method of the compensated component for each target and provides an analysis of accuracy from both theoretical and simulation perspectives. The track estimation and imaging results in the simulations and real data experiments validate the effectiveness of the proposed method, with an estimation accuracy of real data experiments within 5 cm. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The airborne and satellite-based synthetic aperture radar enables the acquisition of high-resolution SAR oceanographic images in which even the outlines of ships can be identified. The detection of ship targets from SAR images has a wide range of applications. Due to the density of ships in SAR images, the extreme imbalance between foreground and background clutter, and the diversity of target sizes, achieving lightweight and highly accurate multi-scale ship target detection remains a great challenge. To this end, this paper proposed an attention mechanism for multi-scale receptive fields convolution block (AMMRF). AMMRF not only makes full use of the location information of the feature map to accurately capture the regions in the feature map that are useful for detection results, but also effectively captures the relationship between the feature map channels, so as to better learn the relationship between the ship and the background. Based on this, a new YOLOv7-based ship target detection method, You Only Look Once SAR Ship Identification (YOLO-SARSI), was proposed, which acquires the abstract semantic information extracted from the high-level convolution while retaining the detailed semantic information extracted from the low-level convolution. Compared to the deep learning detection methods proposed by previous authors, our method is more lightweight, only 18.43 M. We examined the effectiveness of our method on two SAR image public datasets: the High-Resolution SAR Images Dataset (HRSID) and the Large-Scale SAR Ship Detection Dataset-v1.0 (LS-SSDD-V1.0). The results show that the average accuracy ( A P 50 ) of the detection method YOLO-SARSI proposed in this paper on the HRSID and LS-SSDD-V1.0 datasets is 2.6% and 3.9% higher than that of YOLOv7, respectively. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The circular synthetic aperture radar (CSAR) has the ability of all-round continuous observation and high-resolution imaging detection, and can obtain all-round scattering information and higher-resolution images of the observation scene, so as to realize the target information extraction and three-dimensional (3D) contour reconstruction of the observation targets. However, the existing methods are not accurate enough to extract the information of vehicle targets. Through the analysis of the vehicle target scattering model and CSAR image characteristics, this paper proposes a vehicle target information extraction and 3D contour reconstruction method based on multiple different pitch-angle observation CSAR data. The proposed method creatively utilizes the projection relationship of the vehicle in 2D CSAR imaging to reconstruct the 3D contour of the vehicle, without prior information. Firstly, the CSAR data obtained from multiple different pitch-angle observations are fully utilized, and the scattering points of odd-bounce reflection and even-bounce reflection echoes are extracted from the two-dimensional (2D) coherent CSAR images of the vehicle target. Secondly, the basic contour of the vehicle body is extracted from the scattering points of the even-bounce reflected echoes. Then, the geometric projection relationship of the "top–bottom shifting" effect of odd-bounce reflection is used to calculate the height and position information of the scattering points of odd-bounce reflection, so as to extract the multi-layer 3D contour of the vehicle target. Finally, the basic contour and the multi-layer 3D contour of the vehicle are fused to realize high-precision 3D contour reconstruction of the vehicle target. The correctness and effectiveness of the proposed method are verified by using the CVDomes simulation dataset of the American Air Force Research Laboratory (AFRL), and the experimental results show that the proposed method can achieve high-precision information extraction and realize distinct 3D contour reconstruction of the vehicle target. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Interferometric synthetic aperture radar (InSAR) processing techniques have been widely used to derive surface deformation or retrieve terrain elevation. Over the development of the past few decades, most research has mainly focused on its application, new techniques for improved accuracy, or the investigation of a particular error source and its correction method. Therefore, a thorough discussion about each error source and its influence on InSAR-derived products is rarely addressed. Additionally, InSAR is a challenging topic for beginners to learn due to the intricate mathematics and the necessary signal processing knowledge required to grasp the core concepts. This results in the fact that existing papers about InSAR are easy to understand for those with a technical background but difficult for those without. To cope with the two issues, this paper aims to provide an organized, comprehensive, and easily understandable review of the InSAR error budget. In order to assist readers of various backgrounds in comprehending the concepts, we describe the error sources in plain language, use the most fundamental math, offer clear examples, and exhibit numerical and visual comparisons. In this paper, InSAR-related errors are categorized as intrinsic height errors or location-induced errors. Intrinsic height errors are further divided into two subcategories (i.e., systematic and random error). These errors can result in an incorrect number of phase fringes and introduce unwanted phase noise into the output interferograms, respectively. Location-induced errors are the projection errors caused by the slant-ranging attribute of the SAR systems and include foreshortening, layover, and shadow effects. The main focus of this work is on systematic and random error, as well as their effects on InSAR-derived topographic and deformation products. Furthermore, because the effects of systematic and random errors are greatly dependent on radar wavelengths, different bands are utilized for comparison, including L-band, S-band, C-band, and X-band scenarios. As examples, we used the parameters of the upcoming NISAR operation to represent L-band and S-band, ERS-1 and Sentinel-1 to represent C-band, and TerraSAR-X to represent X-band. This paper seeks to bridge this knowledge gap by presenting an approachable exploration of InSAR error sources and their implications. This robust and accessible analysis of the InSAR error budget is especially pertinent as more SAR data products are made available (e.g., NISAR, ICEYE, Capella, Umbra, etc.) and the SAR user-base continues to expand. Finally, a commentary is offered to explore the error sources that were not included in this work, as well as to present our thoughts and conclusions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

As the electromagnetic environment becomes increasingly complex, a synthetic aperture radar (SAR) system with wideband active transmission and reception is vulnerable to interference from devices at the same frequency. SAR interference detection using the transform domain has become a research hotspot in recent years. However, existing transform domain interference detection methods exhibit unsatisfactory performance in complex interference environments. Moreover, most of them rely on label information, while existing publicly available interference datasets are limited. To solve these problems, this paper proposes an SAR unsupervised interference detection model that combines Canny edge detection with vision transformer (CEVIT). Using a time–frequency spectrogram as input, CEVIT realizes interference detection in complex interference environments with multi-interference and multiple types of interference by means of a feature extraction module and a detection head module. To validate the performance of the proposed model, experiments are conducted on airborne SAR interference simulation data and Sentinel-1 real interference data. The experimental results show that, compared with the other object detection models, CEVIT has the best interference detection performance in a complex interference environment, and the key evaluation indexes (e.g., Recall and F1-score) are improved by nearly 20%. The detection results on the real interfered echo data have a Recall that reaches 0.8722 and an F1-score that reaches 0.9115, which are much better than those of the compared methods, and the results also indicate that the proposed model achieves good detection performance with a fast detection speed in complex interference environments, which has certain practical application value in the interference detection problem of the SAR system. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In large-scale remote sensing scenarios characterized by intricate terrain, the straightforward road imaging features in synthetic aperture radar (SAR) images make them susceptible to interference from other elements such as ridges, compromising the robustness of conventional SAR image road extraction methods. This paper introduces a method that integrates Gaofen-3 (GF-3) with a resolution of 3.0 m, Digital Elevation Models (DEMs), and Gaofen-2 (GF-2) remote sensing image data with a resolution of 4.0 m, aiming to improve the performance of road extraction in complex terrain. Leveraging DEMs, this study addresses the limitations in feature-based SAR algorithms, extending their application to complex remote sensing scenarios. Decision-level fusion, integrating SAR and multispectral images, further refines road extraction precision. To overcome issues related to terrain interference, including fragmented road segments, an adaptive rotated median filter and graph-theory-based optimization are introduced. These advancements collectively enhance road recognition accuracy and topological precision. The experimental results validate the effectiveness of the multi-source remote sensing image fusion and optimization methods. Compared to road extraction from multispectral images, the F1-score of the proposed method on the test images increased by 2.18%, 4.22%, and 1.4%, respectively. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Deep neural networks have achieved remarkable results in the field of polarimetric synthetic aperture radar (PolSAR) image classification. However, PolSAR is affected by speckle imaging, resulting in PolSAR images usually containing a large amount of speckle noise, which usually leads to the poor spatial consistency of classification results and insufficient classification accuracy. Semantic segmentation methods based on deep learning can realize the task of image segmentation and classification at the same time, producing fine-grained and smooth classification maps. However, these approaches require enormous labeled data sets, which are laborious and time-consuming. Due to these issues, a new multi-modal contrastive fully convolutional network, named MCFCN, is proposed for PolSAR image classification in this paper, which combines multi-modal features of the same pixel as inputs to the model based on a fully convolutional network and accomplishes the classification task using only a small amount of labeled data through contrastive learning. In addition, to describe the PolSAR terrain targets more comprehensively and enhance the robustness of the classifier, a pixel overlapping classification strategy is proposed, which can not only improve the classification accuracy effectively but also enhance the stability of the method. The experiments demonstrate that compared with existing classification methods, the classification results of the proposed method for three real PolSAR datasets have higher classification accuracy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The interference of natural factors on the sea surface often results in a blurred background in Synthetic Aperture Radar (SAR) ship images, and the detection difficulty is further increased when different types of ships are densely docked together in nearshore scenes. To tackle these hurdles, this paper proposes a target detection model based on YOLOv5s, named YOLO-CLF. Initially, we constructed a Receptive Field Enhancement Module (RFEM) to improve the model's performance in handling blurred background images. Subsequently, considering the situation of dense multi-size ship images, we designed a Cross-Layer Fusion Feature Pyramid Network (CLF-FPN) to aggregate multi-scale features, thereby enhancing detection accuracy. Finally, we introduce a Normalized Wasserstein Distance (NWD) metric to replace the commonly used Intersection over Union (IoU) metric, aiming to improve the detection capability of small targets. Experimental findings show that the enhanced algorithm attains an Average Precision (AP50) of 98.2% and 90.4% on the SSDD and HRSID datasets, respectively, which is an increase of 1.3% and 2.2% compared to the baseline model YOLOv5s. Simultaneously, it has also achieved a significant performance advantage in comparison to some other models. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The UAV-borne video SAR (ViSAR) imaging system requires miniaturization, low power consumption, high frame rates, and high-resolution real-time imaging. In order to satisfy the requirements of real-time imaging processing for the UAV-borne ViSAR under limited memory and parallel computing resources, this paper proposes a method of embedded GPU-based real-time imaging processing for the UAV-borne ViSAR. Based on a parallel programming model of the compute unified device architecture (CUDA), this paper designed a parallel computing method for range-Doppler (RD) and map drift (MD) algorithms. By utilizing the advantages of the embedded GPU characterized with parallel computing, we improved the processing speed of real-time ViSAR imaging. This paper also adopted a unified memory management method, which greatly reduces data replication and communication latency between the CPU and the GPU. The data processing of 2048 × 2048 points took only 1.215 s on the Jetson AGX Orin platform to form a nine-consecutive-frame image with a resolution of 0.15 m, with each frame taking only 0.135 s, enabling real-time imaging at a high frame rate of 5 Hz. In actual testing, continuous mapping can be achieved without losing the scenes, intuitively obtaining the dynamic observation effects of the area. The processing results of the measured data have verified the reliability and effectiveness of the proposed scheme, satisfying the processing requirements for real-time ViSAR imaging. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Data, in deep learning (DL), are crucial to detect ships in synthetic aperture radar (SAR) images. However, SAR image annotation limitations hinder DL-based SAR ship detection. A novel data-selection method and teacher–student model are proposed in this paper to effectively leverage sparse labeled data and improve SAR ship detection performance, based on the semi-supervised oriented object-detection (SOOD) framework. More specifically, we firstly propose a SAR data-scoring method based on fuzzy comprehensive evaluation (FCE), and discuss the relationship between the score distribution of labeled data and detection performance. A refined data selector (RDS) is then designed to adaptively obtain reasonable data for model training without any labeling information. Lastly, a Gaussian Wasserstein distance (GWD) and an orientation-angle deviation weighting (ODW) loss are introduced to mitigate the impact of strong scattering points on bounding box regression and dynamically adjusting the consistency of pseudo-label prediction pairs during the model training process, respectively. The experiments results on four open datasets have demonstrated that our proposed method can achieve better SAR ship detection performances on low-proportion labeled datasets, compared to some existing methods. Therefore, our proposed method can effectively and efficiently reduce the burden of SAR ship data labeling and improve detection capacities as much as possible. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Crop identification at the field level using remote sensing data is a very important task. However, the use of multispectral data for the construction of vegetation indices is sometimes impossible or limited. For such situations, solutions based on the use of time series of synthetic aperture radar (SAR) indices are promising, eliminating the problems associated with cloudiness and providing an assessment of crop development characteristics during the growing season. We evaluated the use of time series of synthetic aperture radar (SAR) indices to characterize crop development during the growing season. The use of SAR imagery for crop identification addresses issues related to cloudiness. Therefore, it is important to choose the SAR index that is the most stable and has the lowest spatial variability throughout the growing season while being comparable to the normalized difference vegetation index (NDVI). The presented work is devoted to the study of these issues. In this study, the spatial variabilities of different SAR indices time series were compared for a single region for the first time to identify the most stable index for use in precision agriculture, including the in-field heterogeneity of crop sites, crop rotation control, mapping, and other tasks in various agricultural areas. Seventeen Sentinel-1B images of the southern part of the Khabarovsk Territory in the Russian Far East at a spatial resolution of 20 m and temporal resolution of 12 days for the period between 14 April 2021 and 1 November 2021 were obtained and processed to generate vertical–horizontal/vertical–vertical polarization (VH/VV), radar vegetation index (RVI), and dual polarimetric radar vegetation index (DpRVI) time series. NDVI time series were constructed from multispectral Sentinel-2 images using a cloud cover mask. The characteristics of time series maximums were calculated for different types of crops: soybean, oat, buckwheat, and timothy grass. The DpRVI index exhibited the highest stability, with coefficients of variation of the time series that were significantly lower than those for RVI and VH/VV. The main characteristics of the SAR and NDVI time series—the maximum values, the dates of the maximum values, and the variability of these indices—were compared. The variabilities of the maximum values and dates of maximum values for DpRVI were lower than for RVI and VH/VV, whereas the variabilities of the maximum values and the dates of maximum values were comparable for DpRVI and NDVI. On the basis of the DpRVI index, classifications were carried out using seven machine learning methods (fine tree, quadratic discriminant, Gaussian naïve Bayes, fine k nearest neighbors or KNN, random under-sampling boosting or RUSBoost, random forest, and support vector machine) for experimental sites covering a total area of 1009.8 ha. The quadratic discriminant method yielded the best results, with a pixel classification accuracy of approximately 82% and a kappa value of 0.67. Overall, 90% of soybean, 74.1% of oat, 68.9% of buckwheat, and 57.6% of timothy grass pixels were correctly classified. At the field level, 94% of the fields included in the test dataset were correctly classified. The paper results show that the DpRVI can be used in cases where the NDVI is limited, allowing for the monitoring of phenological development and crop mapping. The research results can be used in the south of Khabarovsk Territory and in neighboring territories. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Long-term series monitoring of ground surface settlement by remote sensing has become an effective method. Based on TS-InSAR (time series Interferometric Synthetic Aperture Radar) interferometry, this paper proposes a new model based on the Grey Wolf Optimizer (GWO) and Long Short-Term Memory (LSTM) to monitor and predict the ground surface settlement in Kunming City. The results show that the MAPE (mean absolute percentage error), RMSE (root mean square error), and MAE (mean absolute error) of GWO-LSTM are significantly reduced. R2 (goodness of fit) in the six sub-study areas of Kunming City is improved in comparison to the LSTM model. The problem of manual parameter selection in the LSTM model is solved by the GWO algorithm to select parameters automatically. This approach not only significantly reduces the model's training time but also identifies the most suitable network parameters. This can bring the best performance. Based on TS-InSAR data, the prediction of urban ground surface settlement by the GWO-LSTM model has good accuracy and robustness, which offers a scientific foundation for monitoring and issuing early warnings about urban land disasters. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Ship detection is a significant issue in remote sensing based on Synthetic Aperture Radar (SAR). This paper combines the advantages of a steady constant false alarm rate (CFAR) detector and a knowledge-oriented Gradient Boosting Decision Tree (GBDT) classifier to achieve the location and the classification of ship candidates. The steady CFAR detector smooths the image by a moving-average filter and models the probability distribution of the smoothed clutter as a Gaussian distribution. The mean and the standard deviation of the Gaussian distribution are estimated according to the left half of the histogram to remove the effect of land, ships, and other targets. From the Gaussian distribution and a preset constant false alarm rate, a threshold is obtained to segment land, ships, and other targets from the clutter. Then, a series of morphological operations are introduced to eliminate land and extract ships and other targets, and an active contour algorithm is utilized to refine ships and other targets. Finally, ships are recognized from other targets by a knowledge-oriented GBDT classifier. Based on the brain-like ship-recognition process, we change the way of the decision-tree generation and achieve a higher classification performance than the original GBDT. The results on the AIRSARShip-1.0 dataset demonstrate that this scheme has a competitive performance against deep learning, especially in the detection of offshore ships. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Synthetic aperture radar (SAR) image registration is an important process in many applications, such as image stitching and remote sensing surveillance. The registration accuracy is commonly affected by the presence of speckle noise in SAR images. When speckle noise is intense, the number of image features acquired by single-feature-based methods is insufficient. An SAR image registration method that combines nonlinear diffusion filtering, Hessian features and edge points is proposed in this paper to reduce speckle noise and obtain more image features. The proposed method uses the infinite symmetric exponential filter (ISEF) for image pre-processing and nonlinear diffusion filtering for scale-space construction. These measures can remove speckle noise from SAR images while preserving image edges. Hessian features and edge points are also employed as image features to optimize the utilization of feature information. Experiments with different noise levels, geometric transformations and image scenes demonstrate that the proposed method effectively improves the accuracy of SAR image registration compared with the SIFT-OCT, SAR-SIFT, Harris-SIFT, NF-Hessian and KAZE-SAR algorithms. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Azimuth multi-channel synthetic aperture radar (SAR) has always been an important technical means to achieve high-resolution wide-swath (HRWS) SAR imaging. However, in the space-borne azimuth multi-channel SAR system, random phase noise will be produced during the operation of each channel receiver. The phase noise of each channel is superimposed on the SAR echo signal of the corresponding channel, which will cause the phase imbalance between the channels and lead to the generation of false targets. In view of the above problems, this paper proposes a random phase noise compensation method for space-borne azimuth multi-channel SAR. This method performs feature decomposition by calculating the covariance matrix of the echo signal and converts the random phase noise estimation into the optimal solution of the cost function. Considering that the phase noise in the receiver has frequency-dependent and time-varying characteristics, this method calculates the phase noise estimation value corresponding to each range-frequency point in the range direction and obtains the phase noise estimation value by expectation in the azimuth direction. The proposed random phase noise compensation method can suppress false targets well and make the radar present a well-focused SAR image. Finally, the usefulness of the suggested method is verified by simulation experiments. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Due to the scheme of fixed-platform beam-steering radar and the space of the blast furnace being subjected to harsh environmental influences, the traditional detection methods of burden surface are limited by geometric distortion, noncoherent clutter, and noise interference, which leads to an increase in the image entropy value and the equivalent number of views, makes the density distribution of burden surface show a diffuse state, and greatly affects the stability and accuracy. In this paper, a new fixed-platform beam-steering radar synthetic aperture radar imaging method (FPBS-SAR) is proposed in the sensory domain of the blast furnace environment. From the perspective of fixed-platform beam-steering radar motion characteristics, the target range–azimuth coupled distance history model under the sub-aperture is established, the azimuthal Doppler variation characteristics of the fixed-platform beam-steering process are analyzed, and the compensation function of the transform domain for geometric disturbance correction is proposed. For noncoherent noise suppression in blast furnaces, the trimmed geometric mean-order-likelihood CFAR method is proposed to take into account the information of burden surface and clutter suppression. To verify the method, point target simulation and imaging for the industrial field measurement data are carried out. The results indicate that geometric distortion is well eliminated, the image entropy value and the equivalent number of views have decreased, and noncoherent noise in blast furnaces is suppressed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]