Radar Backscattering Properties of Corn And Soybeans at Frequencies of 1.6, 4.75, And 13.3 GHz

Aided by the U.S. Department of Agriculture, the NASA Johnson Space Center made an observational study of the radar-backscattering properties of corn and soybeans in commercial fields in a test site in Webster County, Iowa. Aircraft-based radar scatterometers measured the backscattering coefficient of the crops at three frequencies, 1.6 GHz (L-band), 4.75 GHz (C-band), and 13.3 GHz (Ku-band), at 10 sensor look-angles (5 to 50 degrees from the nadir in steps of 5 degrees), and with several polarization combinations. They produced 50 combinations of frequency, look-angle, and polarization for analysis for about 80 fields on two flight dates.