Correcting and Measuring Ionospheric Scintillation Amplitude Stripes in L-Band SAR Images

The amplitude stripes induced by the ionospheric scintillation have been frequently observed in spaceborne L-band synthetic aperture radar (SAR) images, such as advanced land observing satellite (ALOS) phased array-type L-band SAR (PALSAR), which may impede SAR applications. From another perspective, the presence of ionospheric stripes implies a reverse guidance for ionospheric sounding. In this letter, a methodology for correcting and measuring ionospheric stripes from SAR images is proposed. First, based on prior information of the stripes’ orientation, the stripe components are automatically detected and extracted using a band-rejection spectral filter. Second, the extracted amplitude errors are further applied to measure ionospheric scintillation parameters by fitting the power spectrum. The methodology is tested on several PALSAR acquisitions. The results indicate that the methodology can automatically correct the stripes and has a great potential of measuring ionospheric scintillation from the SAR images with amplitude stripes.