A Novel Processing Strategy for Staggered SAR

Staggered synthetic aperture radar (SAR) is an innovative concept, where the pulse repetition interval (PRI) is continuously varied. This, in combination with digital beamforming (DBF) on receive, allows high-resolution imaging of a wide continuous swath without the need for a long antenna with multiple apertures. However, staggered-SAR systems require a mean pulse repetition frequency (PRF) much larger than the signal Doppler bandwidth and allow the use of transmitted pulses of limited length. This letter proposes a novel processing strategy for staggered SAR data, which allows a reduction of the mean PRF and the use of longer transmitted pulses. The performance obtained with the proposed novel strategy is evaluated and compared with a conventional SAR system operating with constant PRI.