Sidelobe Suppression of SAR Image based on MSVA

Modified Spatially Variant Apodization (MSVA) is one of the nonlinear apodization methods used for sidelobe control in SAR image while maintaining mainlobe resolution unchanged. In this paper we propose PFA-MSVA algorithm which combines polar format algorithm (PFA) and MSVA. Also, we apply this algorithm to process airborne SAR data and show that by using MSVA one can get better resolution and lower sidelobe level compared with using classic windowing techniques such as Hamming, etc. The simulated and experimental data results demonstrate the effectiveness and practicability of the proposed algorithm.