Introduction to Microwave

Remote Sensing

Dr. Sandra Cruz Pol

Microwave Remote Sensing INEL 6069
Dept. of Electrical & Computer Engineering,
UPRM, Mayagüez, PR
Fall 2006

1
Outline

What is radiometry?

Importance of Microwaves

Radar

Radiometer

Brief history

Recent applications

Plane Waves

Antennas

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What is
radiometry?

All objects radiate
EM energy.

Radiometry measures of
natural EM radiation
from objects; earth, ice,
plants...

3
Electromagnetic Spectrum

http://www.lbl.gov/MicroWorlds/ALSTool/EMSpec/EMSpec2.html 4
Why Microwaves?

Capability to penetrate clouds and, to

some extent, rain.

Independence of the sun as a source

of illumination.

Provides info about geometry and bulk-

dielectric properties.(e.g. salinity)

5
3 stages of El Niño
Why Microwaves?

Penetrate more deeply into vegetation

than optical waves.

Penetrate into ground (more into dry than
wet soil).

Visible and IR sensors can sometimes be

used to complement this information
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Soil Penetration
[www.uni.edu/storm/rs/2001/vh7.html]

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Snow – microwave penetration

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 Microwave Radar Bands
BAND Nominal SPECIFIC
Designation Frequency Range Bands

HF 3-30 MHz0

138-144 MHz
VHF 30-300 MHz
216-225
420-450 MHz
UHF 300-1000MHz
890-942
L 1-2 GHz 1.215-1.4 GHz
2.3-2.5 GHz
S 2-4 GHz
2.7-3.7>
C 4-8 GHz 5.25-5.925 GHz
X 8-12 GHz 8.5-10.68 GHz
13.4-14.0 GHz
Ku 12-18 GHz
15.7-17.7
24.05-24.25
K 18-27 GHz
GHz
Ka 27-40 GHz 33.4-36.0 GHz
V 40-75 GHz 59-64 GHz
76-81 GHz
W 75-110 GHz
92-100 (millimeter) 9
millimeter 110-300 GHz www.serve.com/mahood/RCS/bands.htm
Where does energy goes?

Energy (EM waves) received at the Earth

from the Sun is
– absorbed (atmosphere , clouds, earth, ocean…)
– scattered
– transmitted

Absorbed energy is transformed
– into thermal energy.

Thermodynamic balance
– through emission, absorption,…RT
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 Microwave Remote Sensing Sensors
Passive– uses of radiometers to study the Earth
Passive sensors are called microwave radiometers, which
receive and detect the radiation emitted from various
objects on the earth

Active– uses RADAR (RAdio Detection And Ranging) to

study Earth
Active microwave remote sensor illuminates the ground with
microwave radiation and then receives the back-scattered
energy from the object. Some of the active microwave
remote sensors are :

Radar: Pulse, Doppler, FM

Side looking airborne radar (SLAR)

Synthetic aperture radar (SAR)

Wind scatterometer

Altimeter
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Polarimeter
 History of Radars

Henry Hertz, 1886 1rst
radio experiment, reflections
detected @200MHz.

1925- Pulse radars to measure
height of ionosphere.

1930- unintentional detection
of airplanes

WWII- detecting ships and
aircraft. Used PPI displays.

MIT- developed magnetron –
hi-power Tx and klystron –Lo-
power source

1938 Altimeter – airborne FM Side Looking Aperture Radar (SLAR)
radars at 400MHz to measure Range resolution =>pulse width
altitude. Azimuth resolution=> antenna size

1950 – SLAR – finer
resolution cause antennas
length up to 15 m fixed || to
fuselage. Airplane motion
produced a scan. www.csr.utexas.edu/projects/rs/whatissar/rar.html
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 Sea Ice and Iceberg Detection
by SLAR

Light blue sea ice

with open water
displayed in green

http://www.etl.noaa.gov/technology/instruments/rads/ice.html
13
 History of Radars

1952- 54 SAR –fine
resolution Doppler, pixel
dimension in the along
track direction
independent of distance
from radar, and antenna
could be much smaller.
[Complex processing to
produce an image.]

Scatterometer – radar
that measures scattering
coefficient. (In ocean,
scatter is proportional to
wind speed.)

1970 – Doppler becomes
major technique for
meteorology.
http://www.met.ed.ac.uk/~chris/RS1Web/sar2-2000/ppframe.htm
RADARSAT is a Synthetic Aperture Radar
(SAR) at C-band. Used for oceanic oil spill and
ice sheet monitoring.
A target's position along the flight path
determines the Doppler frequency of its echoes:
Targets ahead of the aircraft produce a positive
Doppler offset; targets behind the aircraft
produce a negative offset. As the aircraft flies a
distance (the synthetic aperture), echoes are
resolved into a number of Doppler frequencies.
The target's Doppler frequency determines its
azimuth position.
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Historyof Microwave Radiometers

1930s- First radiometers used for

radio-astronomy

1950s- First radiometers used for

terrestrial observations

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 Water absorption measurements

circa 1945

A Radiation Laboratory roof-
top crew use microwave
radiometer equipment
pointed at the sun to
measure water absorption by
the atmosphere. Atop
Building 20 (from left):
Edward R. Beringer, Robert
L. Kyhl, Arthur B. Vane, and
Robert H. Dicke (Photo from
Five Years at the Radiation
Laboratory)

http://rleweb.mit.edu/groups/g-radhst.HTM 16
Why monitor WV?

Water vapor is one of the most significant

constituents of the atmosphere since it is the means
by which moisture and latent heat are transported to
cause "weather".

Water vapor is also a greenhouse gas that plays a
critical role in the global climate system. This role is
not restricted to absorbing and radiating energy from
the sun, but includes the effect it has on the
formation of clouds and aerosols and the chemistry
of the lower atmosphere.

Despite its importance to atmospheric processes
over a wide range of spatial and temporal scales, it is
one of the least understood and poorly described
components of the Earth's atmosphere.
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 Temperature profiles
1965

On location at the National Center for
Atmospheric Research (NCAR) in
Texas. A launch crew prepares a 60-
GHz atmospheric sensing receiver.
Once lofted airborne by balloon, the
receiver remotely sensed the
temperature profile at different
altitudes.

These experiments evolved into the
Nimbus series of NASA satellites,
which later became part of the
National Oceanic and Atmospheric
Administration's (NOAA) satellite
weather forecasting system. (RLE file
photo)
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Atmospheric Imagers

1977

Checking an instrument
that is the direct forerunner
of today's operational
satellite microwave
atmospheric imagers used
by NOAA

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 Modern Microwave Water Radiometer
(MWR)

Provides time-series
measurements of column-
integrated amounts of
water vapor and liquid
water.
The instrument itself is
essentially a sensitive
microwave receiver.
That is, it is tuned to measure
the microwave emissions
of the vapor and liquid
water molecules in the
atmosphere at specific
frequencies. (~22 GHz) 20
 Truck mounted radiometer

This truck-mounted
microwave
radiometer system
measures surface
soil moisture at L,
S and C bands.

http://daac.gsfc.nasa.gov/CAMPAIGN_DOCS/SGP97/slmr.html#100
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 Medical Applications

Microwave Radiometry can be used for the detection
of different diseases.
– Madison, WI- tumor-detection system exploits the large
dielectric contrast between normal breast tissues and
malignant tumors at microwave frequencies.
– Clinical trials at Moscow oncological centers, conducted in
over 1000 patients have shown that breast cancer detective
ability of microwave radiometry is ~90%.

Microwave Radiation used for treatment.
– The microwave procedure used a finely focused beam which
heats up and kills tumour cells. The trial is being organised
at two centres in the US, in Palm Beach, Florida, and the
Harbor UCLA Medical Centre in California.

Dr Robert Gardner, at Palm Beach, said: "Based on the

animal data, this is a technique that will work, and has the
potential to replace surgery for some patients who develop
breast cancer." 1999
www.resltd.ru/eng/company/r_history.php 22
www.whitaker.org/abstracts/jun99/hagness.html
Microwave Temperature Profiler

is a microwave radiometer that measures

thermal emission from oxygen molecules
along a line of sight that is scanned in
elevation angle.

Knowledge gained in developing this
radiometers are useful in developing
radiometers for unstart-prevention systems
in high-speed (up to mach 2.4) civil-
transport aircrafts.
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Weather Applications: radar

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 NASA Topex/Poseidon and Jason 1

Altimeter on board measures sea levels

with accuracy to better than 5 cm!

One of the contributions to the

altimetric delay is the wet path
delay caused by tropospheric
water vapor in the altimetric signal
path.

The wet path delay is the
additional time that it takes for the
signal to pass through the water
vapor.

If this contribution is not
subtracted from the measured
altimetric delay, this additional
time will introduce error to the 25
measured sea surface height.
 NASA Jason 1

A downward-looking water
vapor radiometer onboard the
altimeter satellite measures
microwave radiation at several
different frequencies, 18 GHz,
21 GHz, and 37 GHz.

These frequencies were
chosen because radiances at
these frequencies are
sensitive to atmospheric water
vapor and liquid water.
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Electromagnetic Plane Waves
-Outline

Maxwell Eqs.

Polarization

Propagation in lossy media

Poynting vector (power)

Incidence (reflection, transmission)

Brewster angle

http://www.geo.mtu.edu/rs/back/spectrum
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Antennas
-Outline

Types

Pattern

Beamwidth

Solid Angle

Directivity, Gain

Effective Area

Friis equation

Far Field

Radiation Resistance

Radome

Antenna Arrays
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