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IEEE JOURNAL OF SELECTED TOPICS IN APPLIED EARTH OBSERVATIONS AND REMOTE SENSING 1

Lake and Fjord Ice Imaging Using a Multifrequency

Ground-Based Tomographic SAR System
Temesgen Gebrie Yitayew, Student Member, IEEE, Laurent Ferro-Famil, Member, IEEE,
Torbjørn Eltoft, Member, IEEE, and Stefano Tebaldini, Member, IEEE

Abstract—The radar backscatter response of snow covered lake
and fjord ice is investigated using a ground based multifrequency
synthetic aperture radar system operated in a tomographic config-
uration. Direct imaging of the snow and ice layering is achieved by
focusing the signal from a two-dimensional (2-D) synthetic array
in the 3-D space. A mathematical derivation describing the prop-
agation of electromagnetic waves across a dense and multilayered
complex medium with arbitrary but finite number of layers is pre-
sented. It is used to estimate the depth and refractive indices of the
snow and ice layers from the tomograms employing a simple least-
square optimization scheme. The lake and fjord ice datasets are
compared with respect to their vertical stratification and estimated
refractive indices. The vertical structure of the reflectivity of the
snow-covered lake ice is investigated and compared at two different
frequencies, X-, and C-band. It is found that snow and ice volume
responses at C-band are very low compared to the correspond-
ing responses at X-band. At both frequencies, backscattering from
surface and interface structures dominate volume contributions.
Index Terms—Fjord Ice, ground-based synthetic aperture radar
(SAR), lake ice, multifrequency SAR, refractive indices, SAR
tomography.
I. INTRODUCTION
YNTHETIC aperture radar (SAR) is a very important tool
S for snow and sea ice characterisation, due to its low sen-
sitivity to weather conditions and its ability to penetrate and
reveal volumetric scattering effects. However, SAR images
are often difficult to interpret, because the radar signals pen-
etrate to some degree into the the snow and ice volumes, and
the recorded echo is the result of the interaction between the
wave and a complex three-dimensional medium. Characteriza-
tion of the vertical layering structure and analysis of the local
distribution of the scatterers in snow and ice requires the use of
imaging techniques describing these complex volumetric media
in a three-dimensional (3-D) space. SAR tomography is such
a technique that offers the possibility of retrieving informa-
tion that cannot be accessed through the conventional 2-D SAR
acquisition configuration [1].
Manuscript received December 22, 2016; revised May 2, 2017; accepted June
14, 2017. (Corresponding author: Temesgen Gebrie Yitayew.)
T. G. Yitayew and T. Eltoft are with the Department of Physics and Technol-
ogy, University of Tromsø—The Arctic University of Norway, Tromso 9019,
Norway (e-mail: tomhawak.gebrie2@gmail.com; torbjorn.eltoft@uit.no).
L. Ferro-Famil is with the IETR Laboratory, University of Rennes 1,
UMR CNRS 6164, Rennes 35000, France (e-mail: laurent.ferro-famil@
univ-rennes1.fr).
S. Tebaldini is with the Electrical Informazione e Bioingegneria, Politecnico
di Milano, Milan 20133, Italy (e-mail: tebaldini@elet.polimi.it).
Color versions of one or more of the figures in this paper are available online
at http://ieeexplore.ieee.org.
Digital Object Identifier 10.1109/JSTARS.2017.2718998
SAR tomography is the extension of conventional 2-D SAR
imaging to three dimensions, and is achieved by the formation
of an additional synthetic aperture in elevation [2]. The coherent
combination of images acquired from several parallel tracks us-
ing multibaseline SAR interferometric techniques allows direct
imaging of the volume, and therefore, it is a promising technique
for the study of volumetric properties and improved estima-
tion of geophysical parameters. Recently, a very high resolution
ground-based tomographic SAR system has been used for three
dimensional imaging of a snow covered fjord ice [1], and snow
pack [3]. In [1], we presented results from 3-D imaging of a
snow covered sea ice using a ground-based tomographic SAR
system and illustrated the potential of coherent 3-D imaging
for providing information such as the location of the dominant
contributions that cannot be accessed through 2-D imaging.
In this work, we investigate and compare the vertical structure
of the radar reflectivity of snow covered lake ice with fjord ice.
The datasets are acquired by a very high resolution ground-based
SAR system, developed at the IETR, University of Rennes 1,
over two different test sites. The first one consists of fresh lake
ice measurement acquired over Prestvannet lake, Tromsø, Nor-
way, and the second one is a low salinity sea ice measurement
collected over Kattfjord, Tromsø, Norway. A simple mathemat-
ical formulation was presented in [1] to describe the distortion
in the focused tomographic SAR signal, and in this work the
scheme is extended for an arbitrary number of layers and applied
for estimating refractive indices and depths of the sublayers of a
multilayer medium with any finite number of sublayers. More-
over, the vertical structure of the radar reflectivity of the lake
ice is investigated and compared at two different frequencies,
X-, and C-band.
The remainder of the paper is organized as follows: Section II
introduces the test sites and the data used in this study. Tomo-
grams from both the lake and fjord ice datasets are presented in
Section III. In Section IV, a general mathematical expression is
derived that can be applied to estimate the depth and refractive
indices of a multilayer complex medium with finite number of
sublayers. Section V compares X-, and C-band acquisitions, and
finally conclusion remarks are given in Section VI.
II. TEST SITES AND DATA COLLECTION
The lake and fjord ice datasets considered in this study are
acquired over two test sites in Tromsø area, Norway by using
a ground-based tomographic SAR system shown in Fig. 1(a).
The system was developed at the IETR, University of Rennes 1,

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2 IEEE JOURNAL OF SELECTED TOPICS IN APPLIED EARTH OBSERVATIONS AND REMOTE SENSING

Fig. 1. (a) Set up of the system. (b) Sketch of the depth of snow and ice covers at the two test sites: Prestvannet frozen lake (top), and Kattfjord (bottom).

TABLE I TABLE II
X- AND C-BAND ANTENNA PROPERTIES VERTICAL RESOLUTION AS A FUNCTION OF NUMBER OF ACQUISITIONS

X-band C-band fc B Vertical resolution for different

(GHz) GHz number of parallel tracks
Antenna properties Elevation Azimuth Elevation Azimuth
# of acq. 36 18 12 6
−3 dB beamwidth ≈ ±9.5◦ ≈ ±9.8◦ ≈ ±30◦ ≈ ±29◦ X-band 10 4 7 cm 14 cm 22 cm 45 cm
Boresight 45◦ 45◦ 45◦ 45◦ C-band 5.845 2.41 11 cm 23 cm 36 cm 78 cm

along the poles in a repeat pass mode. Table II summarizes the

France. It consists of four wideband rectangular horn antennas
that are displaced in both azimuth and elevation directions. The
transmission and reception of the radar signal is controlled by a
vector network analyzer (VNA). Both the VNA and the antennas
are contained in a metallic box that is mounted on a long linear
rail whose effective aperture length is 3 m. A stepped motor is
used to displace the metallic box along the rail parallel to the
observed scene to acquire multiple images exploiting the SAR
technique. The rail is fixed on two vertical supports (poles). The
poles are 3 m long and the operating altitude of the antennas can
be adjusted to values  3 m. A more detailed description of the
set up of the acquisition system can be found in [1]. The sys-
tem employs a stepped frequency continuous wave form. The
mean angular position (boresight) in both azimuth and elevation
is 45◦ . The antenna properties for both bands are summarized
in Table I. Each of the four antennas can be operated either as
transmitter or receiver. Consequently, six equivalent monostatic
phase centers with a vertical offset can be achieved in a sin-
gle pass [1]. Depending on the desired vertical resolution, more
acquisitions can be obtained by moving the rail up and down
achievable vertical resolution values for different number of X-,
and C-band acquisitions. In this study, all the results are pro-
duced from 36 acquisitions. Typical ground range and azimuth
resolution values at X-band are 3.75 and 4 cm, respectively.
In summary, the system is a very high resolution tomographic
SAR system that can be operated at different frequencies (C-,
X-, and Ku-bands) and polarizations. Ground range coverage of
the system ranges from 6 to 8 m. As a remark, all the resolu-
tion values reported in Table II are computed at an incidence
angle of 45◦ . In Table II, fc and B, respectively, represent the
carrier frequency and the bandwidth of the bands used in this
study, whereas the abbreviation “# of acq.” stands for number
of acquisitions.
The fjord ice data were collected over Kattfjord, Tromsø,
in March 2013. It is seasonal ice with a life of up to three to
four months. On the day the data were collected, the weather
was cold and dry, with a light, dry, and intermittent snowfall.
The temperature reading, as it is obtained from the Norwegian
Meteorological Institute, was −8 °C for the minimum and −2 °C
for the maximum. The depth of snow at the fjord was about
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YITAYEW et al.: LAKE AND FJORD ICE IMAGING USING A MULTIFREQUENCY GROUND-BASED TOMOGRAPHIC SAR SYSTEM
24 cm and the depth of the ice was about 28 cm [see Fig. 1(b)].
The sea water at the fjord was relatively fresh and, therefore, the
ice formed can be seen under the framework of low salinity sea
ice. This is mainly attributed to the fresh water coming from the
surrounding land during the early periods of the winter. Here,
we would like to note that through out the paper, the term “sea
ice” and “fjord ice” are used interchangeably to refer to the ice
from Kattfjord.
The lake ice data were collected over Prestvannet lake, in
Tromsø, Norway. The shallow lake is located in the middle of
the island, and is usually not deeper than 4 m. Only at the center,
where measurements were taken, greater depths are reached.
The ice formed at the lake is also seasonal and can have a life
of up to four months. The temperature reading at the lake was
−5.4 °C for the minimum, and −0.5 °C for the maximum. The
depth of snow at the lake was about 20 cm and the depth of
the ice was about 90 cm [see Fig. 1(b)]. The ice at both sites
contain significant amounts of air bubbles of size in the order of
few millimetres (ranging from 0.5 to 7 mm) [1], [4]. The snow
cover on top of the ice was dry at both sites. The tomographic
datasets considered in this study can be grouped into two sets.
The first set consists of X-band measurements collected over
both test sites acquired at VV polarization. This set will be used
to investigate and compare the vertical structure of the radar
reflectivity of the lake ice with that of the fjord ice. The second
set consists of X-band and C-band measurements acquired at VV
polarization over the lake. This set will be used to investigate
and compare the vertical structure of the radar reflectivity of the
snow and ice from the lake at two different frequencies.
III. LAKE AND FJORD ICE TOMOGRAMS
Description of the signal model from the 2-D synthetic array
of the tomographic SAR system used here for data collection is
given in [1]. Focusing the signal onto a 3-D grid is achieved by
time domain back projection [1], [5]. This focusing technique
for tomographic SAR data involves three main steps, namely
formation of a three dimensional focusing grid, inverse discrete
Fourier transform, and interpolation. A brief description of the
focusing process including some mathematical expressions can
be found in [1]. The focused signal is presented in the form of
tomograms (2-D sectional images) by vertically sectioning the
3-D image of the considered medium in a height versus ground
range plane. As it is shown in [1], [3], tomograms are distorted as
a result of different propagation velocity of the transmitted radar
wave in snow and ice than in air. It is pointed out in [1] that this
distortion can be corrected in two different ways. The first one
is a post focusing approach by making use of interpolation [1],
and the second is by recomputing the radar-scatterer distances by
considering the actual propagation velocities in each layer [3].
In this paper, the the former approach is adopted for simplicity
reasons.
Tomograms from both the lake and fjord ice datasets are pre-
sented in Fig. 2. All are produced from 36 X-band acquisitions
at VV polarization. Fig. 2(a) is an intensity tomogram of the
lake ice displayed as height-ground range section, and Fig. 2(c)
shows the corresponding coherence ratio (CR) tomogram.
3
Mathematical definitions of these two parameters can be found
in [1]. The intensity represents the square modulus of the
matched filter response of the collected tomographic SAR sig-
nal, whereas the CR represents the coherent to incoherent focus-
ing amplitude ratio and can be used to highlight the responses at
and around the interfaces. The tomograms are obtained by aver-
aging 37 azimuth looks. Note here that the tomograms of Fig. 2
are obtained after radiometric and propagation delay correction
of the datasets [1], [3]. From these tomograms, it can be clearly
seen that the reconstructed volumetric media of the two test sites
are characterized by a complex multilayered vertical structure.
It is discussed in [1] in detail that the focused tomographic SAR
signal of such a multilayer medium is characterized by stronger
responses at and around the interfaces, compared to the section
of the layers farther away from the interfaces.
Comparing the lake ice tomograms of Fig. 2(a) and (c) with
the in situ information of Fig. 1(a), the top layer (from 0 to
around −0.2 m) corresponds to the snow layer. The relatively
strong response around −0.2-m depth corresponds to the snow–
ice interface. From this interface until the very bottom structure
(around −1.1 m), which corresponds to the ice–water inter-
face, is the lake ice layer. From the tomograms, it can be noted
that this lake ice layer contains multiple sublayers. The ver-
tical stratification within the lake ice is a clear indication of
the existence of multiple homogeneous sublayers of different
geophysical property within the medium. Such structures can
be used as indicators of environmental conditions such as local
temperature history [6]. Characterization of the sublayers in the
lake ice layer will be revisited in Section IV.
Fig. 2(b) and (d), respectively, are the intensity and CR
tomograms of the Kattfjord test site. In terms of the two to-
mograms, it can be clearly seen that the reconstructed volume
contains three distinct structures having strong backscatter
power. These structures correspond to the three interfaces of
the imaged scene, where the top corresponds to air-snow, the
middle to the snow–ice and the very bottom to the ice–sea inter-
faces. As it is discussed in detail in [1], these strong responses
around the interfaces may not be due to the scattering at the inter-
faces alone, but also due to contributions from the surrounding
volume. From the tomograms, it can also be noted that the ice
layer is characterized by relatively stronger intensity response
than the snow layer. Here, note that the scattering contributions
of the snow or ice layer refer to both surface/interface and vol-
ume contributions. A detailed discussion and characterization
of the tomographic signal from the fjord dataset are presented
in [1]. Here, more attention is given to the potential similarities
and differences of the focused signal from the snow covered ice
of the two test sites.
One of the notable similarities between the intensity tomo-
grams of the two test sites is that the backscatter signal at and
around the interface is stronger than the response from the sec-
tion of the layers farther away from the interfaces. This can
be associated to the dielectric discontinuity at all the interfaces
(between adjacent layers) and small scale roughness at the top
surface of the snow and ice layers [1]. However, the air–snow
interface in the fjord ice tomogram is characterized by a slightly
stronger response than the corresponding interface in the lake ice
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4 IEEE JOURNAL OF SELECTED TOPICS IN APPLIED EARTH OBSERVATIONS AND REMOTE SENSING
Fig. 2. Multilooked tomograms after correction of refraction effects based on 36 acquisitions from the two test sites at X-band, VV polarization. (a) and (c) are,
respectively, intensity and CR tomograms from the lake ice dataset. (b) and (d) are, respectively, intensity and CR tomograms from the Kattfjord dataset.
Fig. 3. Dry and homogeneous snow layer at the two test sites. (a) Thin layer
of snow crust (about 5 mm) on top of the snow layer at the Kattfjord site.
(b) Homogeneous snow layer at Prestvannet frozen lake test site.
dataset. This is due to the presence of a thin and relatively com-
pact snow crust at the top of the snow layer in the fjord dataset.
This has been observed during data collection and shown in
Fig. 3(a). Such structures can be formed as a result of melting
and refreezing of the top part of the snow in response to varia-
tions in temperature and wind conditions [7]. As it can be clearly
seen from the photo of Fig. 3(b), the snow covering the lake ice
does not contain such structures and is homogeneous from top
to bottom. Prestvannet frozen lake is located in the middle of the
island, surrounded by trees, and the accumulation of snow and
the growth of the ice are taken place in a relatively more stable
condition compared to that of the fjord, which is relatively open
and connected to the ocean.
Another observation is that, except for the bottom half of
the lake ice layer (from around −0.6 to −1.1 m), the response
from the ice is stronger than the snow one in both test sites.
This is mainly attributed to the difference in size of the inho-
mogeneities in the snow and inhomogeneities in the ice. The
main inhomogeneities in both types of ice considered here are
the air bubbles with size ranging from 0.5 to 7 mm. These air
bubbles which are irregularly shaped, randomly oriented, and
connected to each other will cause discontinuity in the back-
ground ice that is on the scale of the wave length than the grains
of the fresh snow would cause on their snow background [1].
The notion that volume scattering from dry and relatively fresh
snow is very low at X-band is linked to the fact that the snow
grains are not on the same scale as the wave length [8], [9], [10].
The relatively low response of the bottom part of the lake ice
can be interpreted to be associated to either the volume extinc-
tion phenomenon caused by the increased involvement of the
air bubbles deep in the ice layer in multiple scattering processes
or the local difference in density of the scattering elements in
the ice layer.
From the tomograms of both test sites, the near range re-
sponse of the medium (for ground range values 1 m) is rel-
atively weak. This is mainly due to a relatively narrow −3 dB
beamwidth, and a rapidly falling radiation pattern of the X-band
antennas (see Fig. 8(a) in Section V). Moreover, it can be ob-
served that the signal is spread across a larger vertical section
at far range than near range. This is due to the fact that the
vertical resolution degraded as we go from near range to far
range [11]. Any nonperfect horizontal appearance of the inter-
faces in the corrected tomograms is because of the fact that our
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YITAYEW et al.: LAKE AND FJORD ICE IMAGING USING A MULTIFREQUENCY GROUND-BASED TOMOGRAPHIC SAR SYSTEM 5

Fig. 4. Distortion (dilation at near range and contraction at far range) of tomograms as a result of vacuum propagation velocity assumption in the focusing
process. (a) Uncorrected lake ice tomogram from Prestvannet frozen lake. (b) Uncorrected sea ice tomogram from Kattfjord. (c) Apparent position of interfaces of
the lake ice dataset plotted for estimated refractive index values of n 1 = 1.3, n 2 = 1.53, and n 3 = 1.74. “1” represents the snow layer, and “2” and “3” represent
two sublayers in the ice layer. (d) Apparent position of interfaces of the fjord ice dataset plotted for estimated refractive index values of n 1 = 1.4, n 2 = 1.7. “1”
and “2” represent the snow and ice layers, respectively.

postfocusing correction procedure is only approximate [1].
Moreover, the fact that the vertical resolution degraded as we go
from near range to far range makes this problem worse. From the
intensity tomograms of both sites, it can also be observed that
most of the interfaces between the layers are characterized by
relatively low responses at large incidence angles. This is due to
the well-known inverse relationship between radar backscatter
cross section of slightly rough natural surfaces and incidence
angle for monostatic radar measurements [12].
IV. INVESTIGATION OF WAVE PROPAGATION INSIDE A DENSE
MULTILAYER MEDIUM OF SNOW AND ICE
It is well known that the propagation velocity of electro-
magnetic (EM) waves changes with the dielectric property of
a given media along the propagation path. The effect of this
change in velocity on tomographic SAR focusing has for ex-
ample been investigated for snow and ice [1], snow pack [3],
and glacier ice [13]. When tomographic SAR signal focusing is
performed based on the assumption of vacuum propagation ve-
locity throughout the whole medium, tomograms are distorted
as in Fig. 4. Both the lake and fjord ice tomograms shown in
Fig. 2 are the corrected versions of Fig. 4(a) and (b). As it can be
clearly seen from these distorted tomograms, all the structures
appear tilted with a positive slope from near range to far range.
As a result of this distortion, the different layers and interfaces
are displaced from their actual positions. For example, the snow
plus ice from the Kattfjord site in Fig. 1(b) is about 52 cm
thick. However, from the tomograms of Fig. 4(b), the recon-
structed medium appears dilated at near range and contracted
at far range. In [1], mathematical expressions describing this
distortion have been derived for two layers, and based on the
derived expressions, the refractive indices of the different layers
have been estimated. However, from Fig. 2(a) and (c), the lake
ice scene contains more than two layers, and in this paper, the
derivation given in [1] is extended for finite number of layers.
The ultimate objective is to show how such an expression can be
used for roughly estimating the depth and the refractive indices
of a general multilayer medium with arbitrary number of layers.
The following derivation is based on the assumption that the
different layers and sublayers are perfectly horizontal. More-
over, piecewise-constant inhomogeneity is assumed in the me-
dia considered, i.e., each of the sublayers are assumed to be
locally homogeneous. Fig. 5 shows the path followed by a wave
transmitted from an antenna elevation position H under two
conditions. The first one considers a propagation with a velocity
c, equal to the one observed in the vacuum (shown in black), and
the second one is when the wave experiences a change in propa-
gation velocity and direction due to a change in refractive index
from air-to-a denser medium (shown in red). Inside the consid-
ered medium, the apparent positions of the scatterers within the
kth layer, whose velocity and refractive index are indicated by
vk and nk respectively, are designated by (yk , zk ), and the corre-
sponding actual positions are designated by (yk , zk ), where the
subscript k = 1, ..., K represents the layer number (see Fig. 5),
and K is the total number of layers. For example, for the fjord
ice dataset, there are only two distinct layers detected by the
radar, i.e., the snow layer and the ice layer. As a result, K = 2.
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6 IEEE JOURNAL OF SELECTED TOPICS IN APPLIED EARTH OBSERVATIONS AND REMOTE SENSING

layer (y2 , z2 ) will be given by:

−v2
z2 = (τ − τd 1 ) cos θ2 − d1
2
y2 = H tan θ0 + d1 tan θ1 − (d1 + z2 ) tan θ2 (4)

where d1 is the thickness of the first layer, θ2 is the angle of

refraction at the interface between the first and second layers,
and τd 1 is the two way propagation delay from the antenna to
this interface. Here again, θ0 , θ1 , and θ2 are related to each other
by Snell’s law.
A relationship between the actual (z2 ) and the apparent (z2 )
elevation position of a scatterer in the second layer can be
obtained by:

1) replacing τ/2 in (4) with τ 0/2 − z 2/c(cos θ 0 ) , which is ob-
tained from (1);
2) replacing τ d 1 /2 in (4) with τ 0/2 + d 1/v 1 cos θ 1 , which is
obtained from (2) after replacing z1 with −d1 .
After the above replacement, a relationship between (z2 ) and
(z2 ) can be obtained from (4), and can be written as
Fig. 5. Sketch showing the apparent target height resulting from a change in
propagation velocity of the transmitted wave inside a multilayered medium of
snow and ice. B is the apparent position of target A when vacuum propagation
z2 cos θ2 n1 cos θ2
velocity c is assumed for focusing. y is the ground range and z is the elevation z2 = + d1 − d1 . (5)
coordinates. n2 cos θ0 n2 cos θ1

A relationship between the actual (z3 ) and the apparent (z3 )

As it can be seen from the figure, the kth layer has a thickness
elevation position of a scatterer in the third layer can be derived
designated by a positive constant dk . For a certain pair of inci-
in a similar fashion as the first and second layers, and can be
dence angle and delay (θ0 , τ ) (see Fig. 5), the apparent location
given by the following expression:
of a target inside the medium (kth layer) assuming propagation
in air is given by  
cτ c z3 cos θ3 n1 cos θ3
zk = H − cos θ0 = − (τ − τ0 ) cos θ0 z3 = + d1 −1
2 2 n3 cos θ0 n3 cos θ1
 
yk = (H − zk ) tan θ0 (1) n2 cos θ3
+ d2 −1 (6)
n3 cos θ2
where τ0 is the delay corresponding to a target at z = 0, and
θ0 = arctan (y/H ) at z = 0. Accounting for wave propagation
inside the first layer (k = 1), the actual location of a scatterer where d2 is the thickness of the second layer, θ3 is the an-
inside the first layer (y1 , z1 ) will be given by gle of refraction at the interface between the second and third
−v1 layers.
z1 = (τ − τ0 ) cos θ1 From (3), (5), and (6), it can be noted that as the number of
2
layers increase progressively, the expressions expand in a certain
y1 = H tan θ0 − z1 tan θ1 . (2) pattern. The same is true for the y coordinate of the position of
Here, θ0 and θ1 are related to each other by Snell’s law. After the scatterer as it can be noted from (2) and (4). Therefore,

replacing τ2 in (2) with τ 0/2 − z 1/c(cos θ 0 ) , which is obtained given the apparent position (yk , zk ) of a scatterer inside the kth
from (1), the following relationship between the actual (z1 ) and layer, its corresponding actual position inside the same layer is
the apparent (z1 ) elevation position of a scatterer in the first given by
layer can be obtained:
  
v1 cos θ1 n0 cos θ1 z  cos θ1 zk cos θk
k
nm −1 cos θm
z1 = z1 = z1 = 1 (3) zk = + dm −1 −1
c cos θ0 n1 cos θ0 n1 cos θ0 nk cos θ0 m =2 nm cos θm −1
where Snell’s law is used to replace velocity ratios with refrac-
yk = H tan θ0 − (dk −1 + zk ) tan θk
tive index ratios. In this paper, n0 , the refractive index of air, is
assumed to be unity. 
k
Similarly, accounting for wave propagation inside the second + dm −1 tan θm −1 . (7)
layer (k = 2), the actual location of a scatterer inside the second m =1
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YITAYEW et al.: LAKE AND FJORD ICE IMAGING USING A MULTIFREQUENCY GROUND-BASED TOMOGRAPHIC SAR SYSTEM
Fig. 6. Simulated tomogram containing four sublayers. (a) Modeled curves
are obtained using (8). (b) Modeled curves are obtained using (9).
Given the actual scatterer positions (yk , zk ), (7) can be rear-
ranged to get expressions for the apparent positions (yk , zk )
nk cos θ0
zk =
cos θk
  

k
nm −1 cos θm
× zk − dm −1 −1
m =2
nm cos θm −1
yk = (H − zk ) tan θ0 .
To validate this model, we simulated a multilayer com-
plex medium having four layers (K = 4), with its horizon-
tal interfaces located at z0 = 0, z1 = −0.15 m, z2 = −0.3 m,
z3 = −0.5 m, and z4 = −0.7 m. Here, arbitrary values of nk ,
i.e., n1 = 1.3, n2 = 1.7, n3 = 2.0, and n4 = 2.3 are used. The
procedure for taking into account the effect of refraction while
simulating multibaseline tomographic SAR data is already dis-
cussed in detail in [1]. The simulated tomogram is shown in
Fig. 6(a), and the dilation at near range and contraction at far
range of the layers is clearly apparent from the figure. Then, the
same values of nk and zk for the kth layer are plugged into (8)
to model the corresponding apparent positions (yk , zk ) of each
interface. The modeled curves are plotted in Fig. 6(a) by super-
imposing onto the simulated tomogram. As it can be seen from
the figure, the model curves fit better at near range compared to
far range. In other words, the model curves fit very well for small
incidence angles θ0 , but deviate from the data as the incidence
angle increases. This is due to the fact that the model is derived
by fixing θ0 at a single value while in reality, the radar observes
at an angular aperture and the recorded backscatter signal is
identified based on delays. At nadir, the incidence and refrac-
tion angles coincide. As a result, the model fits exactly to the
data. However, as the incidence angle increases, the deviation
7
of the refraction angle from the incidence angle also increases
[see Fig. 6(a)]. Consequently, the uncertainty in locating the
apparent position of a given scatterer increases as a function of
range. From the simulated data, we empirically found out that
this deviation is uniquely related to the refractive index of each
layer. Multiplying the expression for the yk component in (8) by
1
nkk corrects this deviation. In other words, the yk component of
1
(8) should be modified as yk = (H − zk ) nkk tan θ0 . For com-
pleteness and ease of reference, (8) is rewritten as in (9) after its
yk component is modified.
nk cos θ0
zk =
cos θk
  

k
nm −1 cos θm
× zk − dm −1 −1
m =2
nm cos θm −1
1
yk = (H − zk ) nkk tan θ0 . (9)
The result of doing so is shown in Fig. 6(b). The improvement
of the fit between the modeled curves and the data is clearly
apparent from the figure. Therefore, for a multilayer medium
with arbitrary but finite number of layers, the distortion resulted
from a vacuum propagation velocity assumption in the focusing
process can be modeled by (9). The most important applica-
tion of modeling this distortion is estimation of the refractive
indices of each layer, as it is demonstrated in the following
section.
A. Refractive Index Estimation of a Generalized Multilayer
(8) Medium From Tomograms
In [3], a numerical search method called fast-marching has
been used for computing radar-scatterer distances for tomo-
graphic focusing, and in the process estimating the permittivity
profile of snow packs. For two layers, i.e., K = 2, the model
derived in (8) has been applied to estimate the refractive indices
of the snow and ice layers of the fjord ice dataset [1], and the
lake ice dataset [4]. However, in [4], despite the fact that the ice
layer in the lake ice dataset consists of sublayers, it was treated
as a single homogeneous layer during the estimation process.
The reason for such treatment was the fact that previous formu-
lations were applicable to two layers only. In this section, the
model derived in section IV is employed to formulate a simple
optimization scheme that can be applied to estimate the depth
and refractive indices of any finite number of layers. Following
that, the optimization scheme is applied to estimate the depth
and the refractive indices of the sublayers in the considered
media. The starting point is manually reading the approximate
positions (yk , zk ) of the interfaces from the distorted tomograms
[such as Fig. 4(a)] and constructing a function fdata (yk , zk ). This
is done by choosing discrete points along the kth interface and
fitting a cubic polynomial. Then a function fmodel (nk , zk , θk ) is
obtained from the derived model of (9). Finally, the refractive
index and the corresponding depth positions of the kth layer
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8 IEEE JOURNAL OF SELECTED TOPICS IN APPLIED EARTH OBSERVATIONS AND REMOTE SENSING
(nk , zk ) are obtained by minimizing the function f given by
f (nk , zk , θk , yk , zk )
= fdata (yk , zk ) − fm o del (nk , zk , θk )
in an iterative least squared optimization scheme. The optimiza-
tion problem can be formulated as
minimize f (nk , zk , θk , yk , zk )
n k ,z k
subject to nk  1, k = 1, . . . , K
zk < zk −1 , k = 1, . . . , K
where z0 = 0 is the elevation position of the interface between
air and the first (top) layer. The first constraint is due to the
fact that EM waves travel at slower speed in dense media such
as snow and ice than in air, and the second constraint makes
sure that each layer will have a non zero depth. In the iterative
optimization scheme given by (11), the outputs of the kth layer,
i.e., (nk , zk ) will be used as inputs for estimating (nk +1 , zk +1 )
of the (k + 1)th layer [see (9)]. The steps involved in estimating
the refractive index and depth of each layer can be summarized
as follows: first, construct the distorted tomograms by focusing
the tomographic SAR signal with the assumption of vacuum
propagation velocity [1]. Then, manually identify the position
of distinct interfaces and fit a polynomial. Finally, the refractive
index and depth of each layer can be estimated by minimizing
the error while fitting the data with the model from (9). In terms
of processing time, the optimization in (11) does not take long.
For example, for three layer, it converges in a few seconds.
For the lake ice dataset, we manually identified three distinct
layers where the top [designated by “1” in Fig. 4(c)] is the snow
layer, and the remaining two layers designated by “2” and “3”
are two sublayers in the ice layer. First, fdata for each layer is
estimated by fitting a third degree polynomial to the interfaces
between the three layers. Then, for the kth layer, the estima-
tion task using (11) is to iteratively look for a pair of height
zk and refractive index nk that minimizes the error while fit-
ting the model [from (9)] with the data (fdata ). For the three
layers, the following values are found: n1 = nsnow = 1.3 ± 6%,
n2 = 1.53 ± 11%, and n3 = 1.74 ± 20%. The corresponding
height positions of the interfaces are: z1 = −0.19 ± 10%, z2 =
−0.37 ± 14%, and z3 = −1.15 ± 19%, where z1 is depth of
the interface between snow and ice, z2 is the depth of the inter-
face between ice layers “1” and “2” [see Fig. 4(c)], and z3 is the
depth of the interface between the ice layer and the water. For the
fjord ice dataset, the refractive indices of the snow and ice lay-
ers have already been estimated in [1]. The reported values are
n1 = nsnow = 1.4 ± 17%, n2 = 1.7 ± 20%. The correspond-
ing height positions of the snow–ice and ice–water interfaces
are −0.24 ± 10% and −0.52 ± 13%, respectively. The errors
reported here are associated to the uncertainties in locating the
apparent interfaces, i.e., estimating fdata in the distorted to-
mograms. These estimated values are summarized in Fig. 7.
Here, it is important to emphasize that the estimation technique
just presented is based on the assumption that the snow and
ice layers are homogeneous and can be represented by their re-
spective bulk dielectric constant values. In other words, local
(10)
(11)
Fig. 7. Staircase distribution of estimated refractive indices as a function of
depth. Left panel: Snow covered lake ice. Right panel: Snow covered fjord ice.
inhomogeneities are ignored, and as a result, the estimated re-
fractive index values can only be considered as approximate.
In an effort to validate the estimated refractive index values,
the distorted tomograms are corrected by making use of the
estimated values [1], and the results are compared with the depth
of the snow and ice layers measured during data collection, i.e.,
Fig. 1(b). The corrected tomograms of the two test sites are
shown in Fig. 2, and as it can be seen from the figure, the layers
are approximately horizontal and their depth positions are in
good agreement with the depths of the snow and ice layers in
Fig 1(b). The estimated refractive index values of the snow at the
two test sites are also in good agreement with the values reported
in the literature for dry and seasonal snow [14], [15], [12], [3].
The refractive index of fresh water ice with no impurities is
approximately constant (1.78) over microwave frequencies and
varies very little with temperature [16]. However, the presence
of impurities results in non-negligible variations, and in such
cases a dielectric mixing formula can be employed to estimate
the dielectric properties of the mixture [15], [17]. The main
impurities in fresh water ice such as lake ice are air bubbles
[18]. The fact that the estimated refractive index value of the
bottom sublayer of the lake ice (1.74 ± 20%) is comparable
with that of a fresh water ice indicates that the bottom part of
the lake ice contains less bubbles and is more close to pure
fresh water ice. However, the refractive index value estimated
for the top sublayer (1.53 ± 11%) is smaller than the refractive
index values reported in the literature for fresh water ice. This
indicates that this layer contains large amounts of air bubbles,
and is more porous than the bottom part. It is pointed out in
Section III that the relatively higher backscatter response of
layer “2” is most likely due to higher air bubble density inside
this layer than in layer “3.” The fact that the estimated refractive
index of layer “2” is smaller than that of layer “3” strengthens
this supposition. The estimated refractive index of the fjord ice
is compared with previous experimental results in [1], and it is
found that the estimated value is within the range of refractive
index values of low salinity ice reported in the literature. The
estimation approach presented above is simple, and it does not
require long processing time. Moreover, such a technique can
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YITAYEW et al.: LAKE AND FJORD ICE IMAGING USING A MULTIFREQUENCY GROUND-BASED TOMOGRAPHIC SAR SYSTEM 9

be applied to datasets of similar semitransparent media such as

dry sand and permafrost. The main limitation of the method is
that it is not fully automatic. As it is discussed above, it requires
manually identifying the positions of the interfaces, and the
presence of well distinct layers.
Comparing the estimated refractive index values between the
two test sites, the refractive index of the snow at the lake is only
slightly smaller than that of the snow on the fjord. This similarity
is not unexpected given the fact that the snow layers at both test
sites are seasonal and dry. The slightly higher refractive index
value of the snow at the fjord may be explained to be due to the
presence of the thin and relatively compact snow crust at the top.
Due to the lack of direct quantitative measurements regarding
salinity and ice stratigraphy, direct comparison of the estimated
refractive indices of the ice at Kattfjord with that of the two
types of ice in the lake is not further investigated. However, it is
important to point out that the estimated refractive index values
of the fjord ice (1.7 ± 20%) and the lake ice sublayer labeled
as “3” (1.74 ± 20%) are within the margins of error does not
necessarily mean that the two ice types are identical. This is due
to the fact that the refractive indices are not only dependent on
the salinity of the ice but also on the presence of other impurities,
mainly air bubbles. In other words, even though the ice at the
fjord is believed to be saline compared to the ice at the lake,
and consequently is expected to have higher refractive index
than the lake ice, the presence of a higher bubble density in the
fjord ice compared to the lake ice would have a compensating
effect to make the refractive indices of the two different ice types
approximately equal.
Finally we would like to note that, the technique presented
above for estimating refractive indices is limited to media with
perfectly horizontal multiple sublayers with constant thickness.
For imaging radar systems covering such a small patch of
ground, the assumption is valid. However, air-borne and space-
borne SAR systems have a relatively larger coverage and the
thickness of the sublayers as well as the topography will not Fig. 8. −3 dB width of the two antennas. (a) X-band (≈ ±9.5◦ ). (b) C-band
remain the same over the imaged area. For such scenarios, the (≈ ±30◦ ).
technique presented above may be modified to take into account
for such changes. One approach could be to replace the thick-
ness dm in (9) by a spatially varying function (which varies as a datasets is assumed to be valid. As it is pointed out in Section II,
function of range). The outputs nk and zk will be spatially vary- both X-, and C-band antennas have the same mean angular
ing functions and the average thickness/depth of each layer can position in azimuth and elevation, which is 45◦ . Fig. 8 shows the
be estimated by fitting a low-pass filtered curve along interface elevation beam pattern of the two antennas. As it can be clearly
boundaries (a technique similar to the one described in [19] for seen from the figure, the C-band antennas have a wider −3 dB
estimating slowly varying helicopter motion can be used). Then, beamwidth than the X-band ones (see also Table I). The signal
either a bulk dielectric constant (by using some averaging) or a from both bands undergone identical calibration procedure.
dielectric distribution function corresponding to each layer can The X-band intensity and CR tomograms of Fig. 2(a) and
be estimated. (c), respectively, are repeated in Fig. 9(a) and (c) for ease of
reference. Fig. 9(b) and (d) show the corresponding tomograms
at C-band after propagation delay correction. Comparing the
V. COMPARISON OF X- AND C-BAND LAKE ICE TOMOGRAMS two intensity tomograms, one can observe interesting differ-
In this section we present tomograms of the lake ice dataset ences. For instance, at C-band, the responses of the medium are
at two different frequencies X-, and C-band. The two datasets dominated by the backscatter signal from the three main inter-
were acquired a day apart. However, there was no significant faces. These are: the strong response around a depth of −0.2 m
difference in terms of weather conditions and snow fall. Both that corresponds to the snow ice interface, the strong response
days were cloudy and the possibility of melting of the surface around a depth of −0.4 m that corresponds to the interface be-
due to direct sunlight is negligible. Thus, comparison of the two tween the two ice sublayers labeled as “2” and “3” in Fig. 4(c),
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10 IEEE JOURNAL OF SELECTED TOPICS IN APPLIED EARTH OBSERVATIONS AND REMOTE SENSING

Fig. 9. Comparison of lake ice tomograms at X- and C-band. (a) and (c) are, respectively, intensity and CR tomograms at X-band. (b) and (d) are, respectively,
intensity and CR tomograms at C-band. All are acquired at VV polarization, and obtained from 36 acquisitions.

and the bottom dominant response around a depth of −1 m

that corresponds to the ice–water interface. This implies that,
for this particular dataset, the volume contributions of both the
snow and ice layers are almost negligible at C-band. This can be
associated to the difference in the scale of the wavelength with
respect to the scattering elements (snow grains in the snow layer
and air bubbles in the lake ice layer). By making use of theoreti-
cal EM scattering models, it is reported in [20] that for relatively
smooth surfaces, volume scattering dominates surface scattering
at both X-, and C-band. The tomograms of Fig. 9 show other-
wise. However, further investigation is needed to make definite
conclusions. The C-band response from the snow is very weak,
and this is not surprising, because even at X-band its response
is already weak.
Another notable difference between Fig. 9(a) and (b) is that
the C-band backscatter is limited to a very short range of inci-
dence angle values at near range. This can be interpreted to
be linked to the way radar backscatter behaves upon inter-
action with relatively smooth surfaces. It is well known that
the radar cross section of slightly rough natural surfaces is in-
versely related to incidence angle for monostatic radar mea-
surements [12]. This inverse relationship is further influenced
by the scale of the wavelength used [21]. Due to the relatively
bigger roughness scale at X-band than C-band (for a given
surface/interface), the X-band radar backscatter decreases at a
slower rate (with respect to incidence angle) than that of C-
band. This is clearly apparent at the three interfaces described
in the preceding paragraph and shown in Fig. 9. It can also be
observed that, close to nadir, the response of the medium at
C-band is stronger than X-band. This is mainly due to the dif-
ference in the beamwidth and patteren of the two antennas (see
Fig. 8). If we had the same beamwidth and pattern at both X-,
and C-band, we would have observed similar responses at near
range.
Fig. 10. “Curved weak response” at the right end of the bottom curved struc-
ture is the residual signal from the very dominant response of the water at near
nadir that is incorrectly focused due to distance ambiguity.
The “curved” weak response between 2.5 and 3.5 m ground
range positions in Fig. 9(b) is due to defocusing of the tomo-
graphic signal at points that are at the same distance (from the
radar) as the water surface at near range. This “curved” response
does not represent an interface, and this can be confirmed by
looking at the corresponding CR tomogram in Fig. 9(d). To
closely investigate this effect, the uncorrected intensity tomo-
gram is shown in Fig. 10. The relatively weak response at the
right end of the “curved structure” at the bottom is due to the
defocusing of the near nadir response of the water surface, i.e.,
it is the residual signal from the very dominant response of the
water at near nadir. This distortion is linked to the fact that
radar-scatterer distances used for 3-D focusing are computed
based on the assumption of vacuum propagation velocity, and
the correction used in this paper is a post focusing approach.
Such distortions can be avoided or minimized by focusing the
signal using distances computed after taking into account re-
fraction and a change in propagation velocity of the transmitted
 This article has been accepted for inclusion in a future issue of this journal. Content is final as presented, with the exception of pagination.
YITAYEW et al.: LAKE AND FJORD ICE IMAGING USING A MULTIFREQUENCY GROUND-BASED TOMOGRAPHIC SAR SYSTEM
radar waves [3]. One last notable difference between Fig. 9(a)
and (b) is that the response from the water at C-band is very
strong. This is associated to the deep penetrating capability of
EM waves at C-band than X-band, and the big dielectric contrast
between ice and water.
VI. CONCLUSION
In this paper, the vertical structure of the radar reflectivity
of a snow covered lake and fjord ice is investigated using a
ground-based tomographic SAR system operated at two differ-
ent frequencies, X-, and C-band. The lake ice dataset collected
at Prestvannet lake in Tromsø consists of a 90 cm thick seasonal
ice covered with a 20 cm thick dry and homogeneous snow layer,
whereas the fjord ice dataset from Kattfjord consists of a 28 cm
thick fjord ice covered with a 24 cm thick dry snow. The ice in
the lake ice dataset consists of sublayers as identified by the very
high resolution radar system. A rigorous mathematical formula-
tion that describes wave propagation across a dense multilayer
medium is presented, and based on the formulation, a simple
optimization scheme is presented for estimating the depth and
the refractive indices of a multilayer medium with finite number
of layers. The estimation procedure is demonstrated on the lake
ice dataset with three layers and the fjord ice dataset with two
layers. The estimated depth and refractive indices of the snow
and ice layers are validated by applying a correction procedure
on the distorted tomograms and comparing the position of the
layers against in situ measurements. A good agreement between
the measured and retrieved depth positions of the snow and ice
layers is found. The vertical structure of the reflectivity of the
snow covered lake ice is investigated and compared at X-, and
C-band. The volume contributions of the snow and ice layers
are very weak at C-band compared to that of X-band. Moreover,
the response of the interfaces at C-band is limited to small in-
cidence angle values compared to that of X-band. Finally, this
paper shows the great potential of SAR tomography for iden-
tifying the position of the dominant scattering centers and the
dominant scattering mechanisms in volumetric media such as
snow and ice, retrieving information such as the depth of the dif-
ferent contributions that cannot be accessed through 2-D SAR
imaging, and studying and comparing the response of snow and
ice volumes to different radar frequencies.
ACKNOWLEDGMENT
The authors would like to thank C. Leconte and F. Boutet,
who were part of the team during the data collection process.
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Temesgen Gebrie Yitayew (S’12) received the
Master’s degree in physics from the Department of
Physics and Technology, University of Tromsø—The
Arctic University of Norway, Tromsø, Norway, in
July 2012, where he is working toward the Ph.D. de-
gree in physics at the same department, since April
2013.
His current research interests include remote sens-
ing of sea ice, SAR polarimetry, SAR interferometry
and SAR tomography applied for 3-D imaging, and
parameter retrieval of volumetric media.
 This article has been accepted for inclusion in a future issue of this journal. Content is final as presented, with the exception of pagination.

12 IEEE JOURNAL OF SELECTED TOPICS IN APPLIED EARTH OBSERVATIONS AND REMOTE SENSING

Laurent Ferro-Famil (S’99–A’00–M’04) received
the M.S. degree in electronic systems and computer
engineering, and the Ph.D. degree from the Univer-
sity of Nantes, Nantes, France, in 1996, 1996, and
2000, respectively.
In 2001, he became an Associate Professor, and
since 2011 he has been a Full Professor with the
University of Rennes 1, Rennes, France, where he is
currently the Head of the Remote Sensing Depart-
ment, Institute of Electronics and Telecommunica-
tions of Rennes, Rennes, France. His current activities
in education are concerned with analog electronics, digital communications,
microwave theory, signal processing, and polarimetric SAR remote sensing.
He is particularly interested in polarimetric SAR signal statistical processing,
radar polarimetry theory, and natural media remote sensing using multibaseline
PolInSAR data, with application to classification, electromagnetic scattering
modeling and physical parameter retrieval, time-frequency analysis, and 3-D
reconstruction of environments using SAR tomography.
Stefano Tebaldini (M’06) received the M.S. degree
in telecommunication engineering and the Ph.D. de-
gree from Politecnico di Milano, Milan, Italy, in 2005
and 2009, respectively.
Since 2005, he has been with the Digital
Signal Processing Research Group, Politecnico di
Milano, Milan, Italy, where he has been a Permanent
Researcher since 2011. He teaches courses on signal
theory and remote sensing at Politecnico di Milano.
He has been involved as a key scientist in several stud-
ies by the European Space Agency (ESA) concerning
the tomographic phase of biomass, and he is a member of the SAOCOM-CS
Expert Group at ESA. He is one of the inventors of a new technology patented
by T.R.E. for the exploitation of multiple interferograms in the presence of
distributed scattering. He also collaborates with the SAPHIR team at the Uni-
versity of Rennes 1, Rennes, France. His research activities mostly focus on
earth observation with synthetic aperture radar and radar design and processing.
Dr. Tebaldini coauthored two papers awarded at EUSAR 2012 as Best Poster
Paper and Second Best Student Paper.

Torbjørn Eltoft (M’92) received the Cand. Real.

(M.S.) and Dr. Scient. (Ph.D.) degrees from the Uni-
versity of Tromsø, Tromsø, Norway, in 1981 and
1984, respectively.
In 1988, he joined the Faculty of Science and
Technology, University of Tromsø—The Arctic Uni-
versity of Norway, Tromsø, Norway , where he was
the Head of the Department of Physics and Technol-
ogy from 2013 to 2015, where he is currently leading
CIRFA, a new Center for Research-based Innovation.
He is a Professor of electrical engineering and is an
Adjunct Professor in the Northern Research Institute (Norut), Tromsø, Norway.
He has supervised 15 Ph.D. and numerous Master’s students. He has a significant
publication record in the area of research signal processing and remote sensing.
His research interests include multidimensional signal and image analysis with
application in radar remote sensing, statistical models, neural networks, and
machine learning.
Prof. Eltoft received the 2000 Outstanding Paper Award in Neural Networks
awarded by the IEEE Neural Networks Council and of the Honourable Mention
for the 2003 Pattern Recognition Journal Best Paper Award.