Use of Satellite Radar Bistatic Measurements for Crop Monitoring: A Simulation Study on Corn Fields

Abstract

This paper presents a theoretical study of microwave remote sensing of vegetated surfaces. The purpose of this study is to find out if satellite bistatic radar systems can provide a performance, in terms of sensitivity to vegetation geophysical parameters, equal to or greater than the performance of monostatic systems. Up to now, no suitable bistatic data collected over land surfaces are available from satellite, so that the electromagnetic model developed at Tor Vergata University has been used to perform simulations of the scattering coefficient of corn, over a wide range of observation angles at L-and C-band. According to the electromagnetic model, the most promising configuration is the one which measures the VV or HH bistatic scattering coefficient on the plane that lies at the azimuth angle orthogonal with respect to the incidence plane. At this scattering angle, the soil contribution is minimized, and the effects of vegetation growth are highlighted.

Potential Applications of GNSS-R Observations over Agricultural Areas: Results from the GLORI Airborne Campaign

“…Several theoretical studies have shown that the elevation angle has an influence on the bistatic signal penetration down to the soil and the retrieval of vegetation parameters [33,34]. For this reason, our statistical analysis of the GNSS-R measurements makes use of two elevation intervals (50-70 • and 70-90 • ).…”

Advances in Remote Sensing of Agriculture: Context Description, Existing Operational Monitoring Systems and Major Information Needs

“…Intensification, on the other hand, achieves higher yields through increased inputs, improved agronomic practices (e.g., drop irrigation), improved crop varieties and other innovations. Papers [30][31][32][33] demonstrate how remote sensing can contribute to the mapping of land under agricultural production. The review paper of Rembold et al (this issue) [34] provides an overview of remote sensing techniques for yield mapping.…”

“…Besides these problems, Foody (2010) [135] points out the importance of ground truthing. The papers [33,[35][36][37] of this special issue provide examples on how to use remote sensing data for reconstructing past land use patterns at the landscape level.…”

Geometric Polarimetry—Part II: The Antenna Height Spinor and the Bistatic Scattering Matrix

“…Scattering from soil is often a dominant element in the return from vegetated surfaces, and owing to the uncertainties in moisture and roughness it remains a challenging problem to model surface contributions from backscattering alone. Guerriero et al [7] report simulations for corn fields in which the potential for obtaining crop parameters is claimed. Carreno-Luego et al [8] have presented measurements of scattering of GNSS-R signals received bistatically and multistatically from a stratospheric platform over boreal forests which showed that there are important polarimetric signatures involving the canopy-soil interaction.…”