SIRAL, a high spatial resolution radar altimeter for the Cryosat mission

SIRAL (SAR Interferometer Radar Altimeter) is the new spaceborne altimeter designed for CryoSat mission. This ESA mission, planned for 2004, will be used to estimate-on a global scale- the fluctuations in mass of sea-ice and land-ice. The novelty of SIRAL concept with respect to conventional pulse-limited altimeter, is the implementation of Doppler processing for along-track resolution enhancement and also of interferometry, used to locate the echo in the across-track direction. The innovative technical features of SIRAL are presented hereafter with regards to the function requirements and also the expected performance.