Performance Analysis on High-Resolution Spaceborne MIMO-SAR Systems

In this paper, we consider the performance of satellite based Synthetic Aperture Radars (SAR) with a Multiple Input and Multiple Output (MIMO) system design. Imaging resolutions in both range and azimuth are derived analytically in the stripmap mode. Furthermore, by taking advantages from MIMO, the satellites may provide SAR with multi-baseline interferometric capability. They therefore can precisely measure height information of targets. Simulation results verify the performance analysis. It is seen that spaceborne SAR incorporating MIMO by multiple satellites has significant performance gains in image resolutions as well as height measurement precision.