The Classical Optics View of Microwave Polarimetry

From classical optics, either the four Stokes parameters (1852) or Poincaré numbers (1892) comprise a complete representation of the polarimetric properties of an observed scene. The Stokes parameters can be evaluated from direct measurements made by a coherent dual-polarized receiver leading to polarimetric portraits. The Classical method works for radiometers as well as radars. In this paper "fully polarimetric" refers exclusively to a typical user’s product. When processed by currently adopted quadratic radar polarimetry (Quad-pol) methodology—decomposition—the user’s products are not fully polarimetric. However, Quad-pol’s four-element scattering matrix is sufficient to avoid that problem by evaluating the Stokes parameters through the 16-element Stokes operator. Fifteen specific user-oriented aspects vividly illustrate the advantages of classical over the quad-pol approach to microwave polarimetry.