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This work focuses on the relationship between real and synthetic aperture radiometers giving a general and common mathematical framework for both of them. It will be demonstrated that a real aperture radiometer array can be understood as a synthetic aperture one, with a high level of redundancy. Therefore, all the recent results from synthetic aperture radiometry can be translated to real aperture radiometer arrays. This fact can be used to create beamforming arrays in a new way. To do this, the beamforming array equation will be written in terms of crosscorrelations between all pair of antenna signals (visibility samples). By properly combining the visibility samples, a new type of digital beamforming radiometer can be implemented, which will benefit from the high calibration accuracy achieved in synthetic aperture radiometers (e.g., The Y-shapedMIRAS radiometer used in the Soil Moisture and Ocean Salinity mission of the European Space Agency) and the flexibility to electronically steer the beam., Peer Reviewed, Postprint (published version)

This work describes a novel dual-band Global Navigation Satellite Systems Reflectometer (GNSS-R) that uses the P(Y) and C/A signals scattered over the sea surface to perform highly precise altimetric measurements. The results derived from two different ground-based field experiments over a dam and over the sea under different surface's roughness conditions are presented. The analysis of the altimetric performance shows that the results obtained using the P(Y) code improve by a factor between 1.4 and 2.4 as compared to the results obtained using the C/A code, respectively, for high and mid-low satellite's elevation angles., Peer Reviewed, Postprint (published version)

Reflectometry using Global Navigation Satellite System's signals of opportunity (GNSS-R) was originally conceived in the early 90s for mesoscale altimetry, and since then, many studies have shown its applicability to other remote sensing applications. In 2002, the Remote Sensing Lab at the Universitat Politècnica de Catalunya started working in Global Navigation Satellite Reflectometry (GNSS-R) to perform a more accurate correction of the sea state when retrieving sea surface salinity from L-band microwave radiometer data (e.g. SMOS). During these 12 years, the lab has developed ground-based, airborne, balloon, and spaceborne GNSS-R payloads for a number of different applications. This paper provides an overview of the families of instruments, and the design choices made., Peer Reviewed, Postprint (published version)

Soil moisture is required to improve meteorological and climate predictions. Global soil moisture maps are nowadays produced daily from SMOS satellite data, with a basic spatial resolution of ~50 km. Recently, using data fusion techniques between SMOS and MODIS data, an operational service has been implemented at the SMOS-Barcelona Expert Center to downscale SMOS data down to 1 km over the Iberian peninsula [1]. However, despite SMOS operates in the passive microwave 'protected' band from 1400 to 1427 MHz, radio frequency interference may degrade the quality of the soil moisture (and sea salinity) retrievals or even prevent them [2]. Signals of opportunity transmitted from Global Navigation Satellite Systems (GNSS) can be used for soil moisture, vegetation, snow, water level. monitoring after reflection (GNSS-R) on the Earth's surface. In principle, even though these signals can also be jammed, their structure and the way they are processed, makes them more robust in front of radio-frequency interference, while at the same time -in principle- can achieve also a better spatial resolution. In this work, the few different GNSS-R techniques are first revised, including their pros and cons. Then a few applications are revised, with special emphasis -but not exclusively- in those in which the UPC Remote Sensing Lab has been working., Peer Reviewed, Postprint (published version)

In recent years GNSS-R has been proposed for ocean remote sensing, both for altimetry and scatterometry. For the later, two main approaches are available: fitting the measurements with a model, or using some observable from the measurements (either the waveform or the delay-Doppler Map) to be directly linked to ocean surface’s roughness. For groundbased and airborne experiments, several direct observables have been proposed to describe ocean surface’s roughness, and they have been used assuming that the observation geometry had little impact on them. However, it may not be true for a spaceborne scenario, since the dynamics are higher. In this work an extensive simulation study is performed, and the first results on how the observation geometry does impact different GNSS-R direct observables is presented., Peer Reviewed, Postprint (published version)

This paper presents calibration and the radiometric performance of the Passive Advanced Unit Synthetic Aperture (PAU-SA) in order to verify the instrument's characterization., Peer Reviewed, Postprint (published version)

Global Navigation Satellite Systems (GNSS) opportunity signals reflected at or near the Earth's surface have already shown their potential to perform retrievals of a number of geophysical parameters. Radio occultations using GNSS signals are also used for atmospheric sensing. This letter presents a GNSS technique to retrieve vegetation water content (VWC). This technique measures the received powers of the GPS signals in open sky and under the vegetation layer. From these two powers, the attenuation due to the vegetation is computed, which is related to the VWC. This letter presents the results obtained after deploying the instrument in a walnut-tree stand for 11 months., Postprint (published version)

This work presents the calibration, characterization, and imaging tests of the Passive Advanced Unit-Synthetic Aperture instrument (PAU-SA). PAU-SA is a fully digital -shaped two-dimensional synthetic aperture interferometric radiometer operating at the Global Positioning System (GPS) L1 band ( GHz), conceived as a test-bed for potential technological improvements in future instruments. Calibration of instrumental offsets is performed by looking to a microwave absorber and the “cold” sky. Since the instrument operates in the GPS L1 band, GPS satellites are imaged therefore, a new way to compute the Flat Target Response (FTR) has been devised. Internal phase/amplitude calibration is performed using a new technique that consists of injecting pseudo-random noise signals. Different paths from the input switch to the antennas are calibrated by means of an external beacon. A near-field to far-field transformation is applied to compensate for differences in the propagation paths. Finally, absolute amplitude calibration is achieved by imaging the GPS satellites constellation when pointing to the zenith. Evaluation of the images’ quality in terms of angular resolution, radiometric resolution and precision, show the goodness of the techniques applied to compensate for instrumental errors, the imaging capabilities of the instrument, and demonstrate their applicability in future missions., Peer Reviewed, Postprint (published version)

The Soil Moisture and Ocean Salinity (SMOS) mission is an Earth Explorer Opportunity mission from the European Space Agency (ESA). Its goal is to produce global maps of soil moisture and ocean salinity using the Microwave Imaging Radiometer by Aperture Synthesis (MIRAS). The purpose of the Passive Advanced Unit Synthetic Aperture (PAU-SA) instrument is to study and test some potential improvements that could eventually be implemented in future missions using interferometric radiometers such as the Geoestacionary Atmosferic Sounder (GAS), the Precipitation and All-weather Temperature and Humidity (PATH) and the Geostationary Interferometric Microwave Sounder (GIMS). Both MIRAS and PAU-SA are Y-shaped arrays with uniformly distributed antennas, but the receiver topology and the processing unit are quite different. The purpose of this work is to identify the elements in the MIRAS’s design susceptible of improvement and apply them in the PAU-SA instrument demonstrator, to test them in view of these future interferometric radiometer missions., Peer Reviewed, Postprint (published version)

Interpolation strategies for calibration of the Soil Moisture and Ocean Salinity (SMOS) mission of the European Space Agency are tested and compared. Calibration strategy (how and how often) is critical in achieving the required performance of any instrument, but it is even more important in very complex instruments such as the new family of synthetic aperture interferometric radiometers and, in particular, in the Microwave Imaging Radiometer by Aperture Synthesis instrument aboard the SMOS mission. On one hand, frequent calibration reduces the available observation time. On the other hand, the calibration requirements for soil moisture applications are more relaxed than those for ocean salinity, so the intercalibration time requirements are very different. Since SMOS drifts are stationary, half-orbit information is available to perform different interpolation strategies. In this letter, these approaches are tested to estimate the calibration parameters between consecutive calibrations. The average root-mean-square phase error is then used to find the optimum interpolation strategy and intercalibration time. On the other side, in real-time instruments, the “future” calibration data are not available at the time of taking the measurements, and predictors are required to estimate the evolution of the calibration parameters from past data only. For these systems, the extended Kalman filter can be used. The intercalibration time in a real-time instrument is evaluated, and the requirements and performances are compared to offline instruments., Peer Reviewed, Postprint (published version)

The Soil Moisture and Ocean Salinity (SMOS) mission is an Earth Explorer Opportunity mission from the European Space Agency (ESA). It was a direct response to the global observations of soil moisture and ocean salinity. Its goal is to produce global of these parameters using a dual-polarization L-band interferometric radiometer the Microwave Imaging Radiometer by Aperture Synthesis (MIRAS). This instrument is a new polarimetric two-dimensional (2-D) Y-shaped synthetic aperture interferometric radiometer based on the techniques used in radio-astronomy to obtain high resolution avoiding large antenna structures. MIRAS measures remotely the brightness temperature (TB) emitted by the Earth's surface, which is not isotropic, since it depends on the incidence angle and polarization, the Soil Moisture (SM) or the Sea Surface (SSS), the surface roughness etc. among others. The scope of this doctoral thesis is the study of some potential improvements could eventually be implemented in future interferometric radiometers. To validate improvements a ground-based instrument concept demonstrator the Passive Advanced Unit Synthetic Aperture or (PAU-SA) has being designed and implemented. Both MIRAS and PAU-SA are Y-shaped array, but the receiver topology and the processing unit are different. This Ph.D. thesis has been developed in the frame of The European Investigator Awards (EURYI) 2004 project entitled "Passive Advanced Unit (PAU): Hybrid L-band Radiometer, GNSS Refectometer and IR-Radiometer for Passive Sensing of the Ocean", and supported by the European Science Foundation (ESF)., Postprint (published version)

The European Space Agency Passive Reflectometry and Interferometry System In-orbit Demonstrator (IoD) aims to perform mesoscale altimetric observations by measuring the Global Navigation Satellite System (GNSS) opportunity signals reflected over the sea surface. Altimetry based on GNSS reflectometry (GNSS-R) is significantly affected by satellite motion, since it requires relatively long integration times to reduce noise. We present the impact of the satellite motion on the GNSS-R observables and the need to retrack the waveforms. By using a detailed GNSSR space mission simulator, the change of delay difference between the direct and the reflected signals during the incoherent averaging of the waveform has been investigated. Their effects on the waveform shape and the altimetric performance are presented comparing the aligned and non-aligned waveforms. Results show that the performance of spaceborne GNSS-R altimeter is seriously degraded without a proper alignment of the waveform samples., Peer Reviewed, Postprint (published version)

Sea surface salinity is a key oceanographic parameter that can be measured by means of L-band microwave radiometry. The measured brightness temperatures over the ocean are influenced by the sea state, which can entirely mask the salinity signature. Sea-state corrections parameterized in terms of wind speed and/or significant wave height have proven not to be fully satisfactory. In 2003, it was proposed to use reflectometry using navigation opportunity signals [Global Navigation Satellite System Reflectometer (GNSS-R)] for sea-state determination and correction of the measured L-band brightness temperature changes associated to the sea state. The novelty of the approach relies in the measurement of the whole Delay-Doppler Map that captures the scattering of the GNSS signals in the whole glistening zone. In this framework, the “Advanced L-BAnd emissiviTy and Reflectivity Observations of the Sea Surface” (ALBATROSS) field experiments were undertaken in 2008 and 2009, collecting an extensive data set of collocated radiometric and reflectometric measurements over the Atlantic Ocean, as well as oceanographic and meteorological data. In this paper, the experimental results and conclusions of the ALBATROSS 2009 field experiment are compiled and presented, showing the great potential of this technique to perform the necessary corrections in future salinity missions. Empirical relationships are derived among measured brightness temperature variations due to the sea-state effect and direct GNSS-R observables, and the sea surface correlation time at L1 band, a key parameter for GNSS-R data processing since it determines the maximum coherent integration time, was experimentally determined., Peer Reviewed, Postprint (published version)

Global navigation satellite system reflectometry of signals is a promising technique to remotely sense a number of Earth’s geophysical parameters, and it has been proposed for ocean monitoring applications such as mesoscale altimetry or sea state monitoring. So far, the following two main approaches have been considered to retrieve a sea state descriptor from measured delay waveforms or delay–Doppler (DD) maps (DDMs): 1) fitting the measurements to a model tuned with the desired parameter or 2) directly linking a property of the measurements with the parameter to be retrieved (e.g., volume of the normalized DDM). However, these approaches provide a single sea state descriptor related to the overall glistening zone where sea state conditions may not be homogeneous. In this letter, the relationship between the physical space and the DD domains is exploited, and a method to retrieve the bistatic scattering coefficient distribution over the observation ocean surface from measured DDMs is proposed., Peer Reviewed, Postprint (published version)

Global Navigation Satellite System (GNSS) Reflectometry was originally proposed for mesoscale altimetry, but today its feasibility for sea state, soil moisture, vegetation and snow height has already been demonstrated. This paper describes a GNSS-Reflectometer develop to perform the sea state correction in L-band radiometric measurements, and therefore, improve the quality of the sea surface salinity retrievals. The instrument is currently being developed as a secondary payload to be launched aboard INTA (Instituto Nacional de Técnicas Aerospaciales, Spanish Aerospace Center) MicroSat-1. The basic principles of operation and the instrument development status are presented., Peer Reviewed, Postprint (published version)

This study provides a general framework to analyze the effects on correlation radiometers of a generic quantization scheme and sampling process. It reviews, unifies and expands several previous works that focused on these effects separately. In addition, it provides a general theoretical background that allows analyzing any digitization scheme including any number of quantization levels, irregular quantization steps, gain compression, clipping, jitter and skew effects of the sampling period., Peer Reviewed, Postprint (published version)

GNSS-R techniques are currently being studied to remotely sense a number of geophysical parameters over different types of surfaces [1-6]. The Interference Pattern Technique (IPT) is based on the measurement of the interference pattern of the GPS direct and reflected signals, after reflecting over the surface, as the GPS satellites move. This paper extends previous studies [7-11], in which water level was monitored [7] and land areas were observed retrieving soil moisture, topography and vegetation height for different kinds of crops (wheat, barley and maize) [8-10], to a snow- covered soils studies., Peer Reviewed, Postprint (published version)

In recent years Global Navigation Satellite System’s signals Reflectometry (GNSS-R) has stood as a potential powerful remote sensing technique to derive scientifically relevant geophysical parameters such as ocean altimetry, sea state or soil moisture. This has brought out the need of designing and implementing appropriate receivers in order to track and process this kind of signals in real-time to avoid the storage of huge volumes of raw data. This paper presents the architecture and performance of the Global Positioning System (GPS) Reflectometer Instrument for PAU (griPAU), a real-time high resolution Delay-Doppler Map reflectometer, operating at the GPS L1 frequency with the C/A codes. The griPAU instrument computes 24 x 32 complex points DDMs with configurable resolution (DfDmin = 20 Hz, Dsmin = 0.05 chips) and selectable coherent (minimum = 1 ms, maximum = 100 ms for correlation loss Dq < 90%)and incoherent integration times (minimum of one coherent integration period and maximum not limited but typically <1 s). A high sensitivity (DDM peak relative error = 0.9% and DDM volume relative error = 0.03% @ Ti = 1 s) and stability (Dq/Dt = 1 s-1) have been achieved by means of advanced digital design techniques., Peer Reviewed, Postprint (published version)

The Global Navigation Satellite Signals Reflections (GNSSR)techniques have been widely used for remote sensing purposes retrieving geophysical parameters over different types of surfaces. Over the ocean, altimetry or sea state can be retrieved. Over land, soil moisture can be inferred and over ice, altimetry, and ice age are also retrieved. This paper presents the results of using GNSS-R techniques to retrieve altimetry from the measurements of an airborne GNSS-Reflectometer., Peer Reviewed, Postprint (published version)

The use of Global Navigation Satellite Signals Reflections (GNSS-R) techniques to retrieve geophysical parameters from surfaces has been increased in the recent years. These techniques have resulted in suitable tools to obtain information about the sea state of oceans, which is very useful to improve the ocean salinity retrieval, and also, information about the soil moisture of lands. The present work focuses on the use of the Interference Pattern Technique (IPT), a particular type of GNSS-R technique, to study vegetation-covered soils. The IPT consists mainly of the measurement of the interference pattern between the GPS direct and reflected signals (the interference power), after they impinge over the ensemble soil surface and vegetation layer. The measured interference signal provides information on the soil moisture of the surface and also, on the vegetation height., Peer Reviewed, Postprint (published version)

En las últimas décadas, ha habido un creciente interés en la determinación de algunos parámetros como la salinidad y altura de la superficie marina (SSS y SSH), o la humedad del suelo. Algunas de estas variables son determinantes a la hora de desarrollar nuevos modelos climáticos más precisos. La salinidad en la superficie marina por ejemplo, es uno de los factores más importantes en la generación de la circulación termohalina. En términos oceanográficos, se llama circulación termohalina a la circulación convectiva que afecta de modo global al conjunto de las masas de agua oceánicas. Este concepto tiene especial relevancia por su significativa participación en el flujo neto de calor desde las regiones tropicales hacia las polares, sin la que no se comprendería el clima terrestre. La circulación es debida a la diferencia de densidad que tiene el agua a diferentes temperaturas y salinidades, con las masas más densas tendiendo a hundirse y las menos densas a ascender. En el caso de las masas oceánicas, esta densidad depende de dos factores: la temperatura y la salinidad. La densidad decrece cuando aumenta la temperatura y crece con la salinidad. Por su parte, la salinidad está ligada a los efectos de la evaporación y las precipitaciones. Al entrar en contacto el aire caliente en las zonas tropicales con la superficie marina, éste produce que el agua se evapore, reduciendo su temperatura e incrementando la concentración salina. Las precipitaciones por su parte, reducen la concentración de sales en la superficie.La importancia que tiene la salinidad en la superficie marina ha hecho que sea necesario conocer su valor con cierta periodicidad y precisión. Gracias a la relación que hay entre la salinidad y la emisión electromagnética que se produce en la superficie marina, se han desarrollado algunas misiones basadas en sistemas de radiometría embarcados en satélites artificiales. Con el propósito de medir la SSS y la humedad del suelo surge, en 1998, la misión SMOS (Soil Mo

Sea surface salinity can be remotely measured by means of L-band microwave radiometry. However, the brightness temperature also depends on the sea surface temperature and on the sea state, which is probably today one of the driving factors in the salinity retrieval error budgets of the European Space Agency's Soil Moisture and Ocean Salinity (SMOS) mission and the NASA-Comision Nacional de Actividades Espaciales Aquarius/SAC-D mission. This paper describes the Passive Advanced Unit (PAU) for ocean monitoring. PAU combines in a single instrument three different sensors: an L-band radiometer with digital beamforming (DBF) (PAU-RAD) to measure the brightness temperature of the sea at different incidence angles simultaneously, a global positioning system (GPS) reflectometer [PAU-reflectometer of Global Navigation Satellite Signals (GNSS-R)] also with DBF to measure the sea state from the delay-Doppler maps, and two infrared radiometers to provide sea surface temperature estimates. The key characteristic of this instrument is that both PAU-RAD and the PAU-GNSS/R share completely the RF/IF front-end, and analog-to-digital converters. Since in order to track the GPS-reflected signal, it is not possible to chop the antenna signal as in a Dicke radiometer, a new radiometer topology has been devised which makes uses of two receiving chains and a correlator, which has the additional advantage that both PAU-RAD and PAU-GNSS/R can be operated continuously and simultaneously to perform the sea-state corrections of the brightness temperature. This paper presents the main characteristics of the different PAU subsystems, and analyzes in detail the PAU-radiometer concept., Peer Reviewed

Sea surface salinity can be remotely measured by means of L-band microwave radiometry. However, the brightness temperature also depends on the sea surface temperature and on the sea state, which is probably today one of the driving factors in the salinity retrieval error budgets of the European Space Agency's Soil Moisture and Ocean Salinity (SMOS) mission and the NASA-Comision Nacional de Actividades Espaciales Aquarius/SAC-D mission. This paper describes the Passive Advanced Unit (PAU) for ocean monitoring. PAU combines in a single instrument three different sensors: an L-band radiometer with digital beamforming (DBF) (PAU-RAD) to measure the brightness temperature of the sea at different incidence angles simultaneously, a global positioning system (GPS) reflectometer [PAU-reflectometer of Global Navigation Satellite Signals (GNSS-R)] also with DBF to measure the sea state from the delay-Doppler maps, and two infrared radiometers to provide sea surface temperature estimates. The key characteristic of this instrument is that both PAU-RAD and the PAU-GNSS/R share completely the RF/IF front-end, and analog-to-digital converters. Since in order to track the GPS-reflected signal, it is not possible to chop the antenna signal as in a Dicke radiometer, a new radiometer topology has been devised which makes uses of two receiving chains and a correlator, which has the additional advantage that both PAU-RAD and PAU-GNSS/R can be operated continuously and simultaneously to perform the sea-state corrections of the brightness temperature. This paper presents the main characteristics of the different PAU subsystems, and analyzes in detail the PAU-radiometer concept., Peer Reviewed

This work describes a novel dual-band Global Navigation Satellite Systems Reflectometer (GNSS-R) that uses the P(Y) and C/A signals scattered over the sea surface to perform highly precise altimetric measurements. The results derived from two different ground-based field experiments over a dam and over the sea under different surface's roughness conditions are presented. The analysis of the altimetric performance shows that the results obtained using the P(Y) code improve by a factor between 1.4 and 2.4 as compared to the results obtained using the C/A code, respectively, for high and mid-low satellite's elevation angles., Peer Reviewed, Postprint (published version)