Model-based polarimetric SAR speckle filter

In this paper, a new framework to filter speckle noise in polarimetric synthetic aperture radar (PolSAR) data is presented. The proposed filter, named the model-based PolSAR (MBPolSAR) filter, is based on exploiting the multiplicative--additive speckle noise model for multidimensional SAR data. The entries of the sample covariance matrix are processed according to this multiplicative--additive speckle noise model as a function of the complex correlation coefficient. Hence, the covariance matrix elements are processed differently. This filtering scheme improves the reduction of speckle noise and ameliorates the estimation of the polarimetric information. The filtering performances of the MBPolSAR approach are first tested quantitatively by means of simulated PolSAR data. In a second stage, they are evaluated by means of experimental SAR data acquired by the Deutsches Zentrum fur Luft-und Raumfahrt. Index Terms--Filtering, polarimetric radar, polarimetry, speckle, synthetic aperture radar (SAR).