Mapping Ionospheric TEC using Faraday Rotation in Full- Polarimetric L-Band SAR Data

In this paper Faraday rotation (FR) derived from full-polarimetric PALSAR data is used for showcasing the potential of L-band SAR for mapping ionospheric TEC. A FR estimation method is presented and its quality and error sources are analyzed. From the FR estimates ionospheric TEC is derived by inverting a geophysical model that relates FR to the geomagnetic field and the TEC. An error analysis is provided and confidence intervals for the processing results are calculated. Full-polarimetric PALSAR datasets are used to exemplify the robustness and sensitivity of the approach. Reference datasets are used to analyze the precision of the results.