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A novel synthetic aperture radar scattering model for sea surface with breaking waves

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  • Marine Technology
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Abstract

In this study a novel synthetic aperture radar (SAR) scattering model for sea surface with breaking waves is proposed. Compared with existing models, the proposed model considers an empirical relationship between wind speed and wave breaking scattering to present the contribution of wave breaking. Moreover, the scattering weight factor p, and wave breaking rate q, are performed to present the contribution of the quasi-specular scattering term, Bragg scattering term, and wave breaking scattering term to the total scattering from the sea surface. To explore the modeling accuracy of sea-surface scattering, a simulated normalized radar cross-section (NRCS) and measured NRCS are compared. The proposed model generated the simulated NRCS and a matching GF-3 dataset was used for the measured NRCS. It was revealed that the performance of the VV polarization of our model was much better than that of HH polarization, with a correlation of 0.91, bias of −0.14 dB, root mean square error (RMSE) of 1.26 dB, and scattering index (SI) of −0.11. In addition, the novel model is explored and compared with the geophysical model of CMODs and satellite-measured NRCS from GF-3 SAR wave mode imagery. For an incidence angle 40°–41°, the relationship between the NRCS and wind speed, relative wind direction is proposed. As with the SAR-measured NRCS, the performance of VV polarization was much better than HH polarization, with a correlation of 0.99, bias of −0.25 dB, RMSE of 0.64 dB, and SI of −0.04.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Aerospace Information Research Institute, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing, 100094, China

    Xiaochen Wang, Yuxin Hu, Bing Han & Wei Tian

  2. Key Laboratory of Technology in Geo-spatial Information Processing and Application System, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing, 100190, China

    Xiaochen Wang, Yuxin Hu & Bing Han

  3. The box 51111, Beijing, 100190, China

    Chunhua Zhang

Authors
  1. Xiaochen Wang
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  2. Yuxin Hu
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  3. Bing Han
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  4. Wei Tian
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  5. Chunhua Zhang
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Corresponding author

Correspondence to Yuxin Hu.

Additional information

Foundation item: The National Natural Science Foundation of China under contract No. 4197060692.

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Wang, X., Hu, Y., Han, B. et al. A novel synthetic aperture radar scattering model for sea surface with breaking waves. Acta Oceanol. Sin. 41, 138–145 (2022). https://doi.org/10.1007/s13131-021-1842-y

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s13131-021-1842-y

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