Correction of Ionospheric Artifacts in SAR Data: Application to Fault Slip Inversion of 2009 Southern Sumatra Earthquake

Abstract

Interferometric synthetic aperture radar (InSAR) is one of the most popular geodetic techniques for studying earthquake-related crustal displacements. Satellite SAR signals interact with the ionosphere when they travel through it during the synthetic aperture time. The condition of the ionosphere and its variation can significantly affect spaceborne InSAR measurements. In this letter, we use the Advanced Land Observation Satellite Phase Array-Type L-band SAR data from the 2009 southern Sumatra earthquake to evaluate the effects of the ionospheric artifacts on the slip distribution inversion of earthquake. The split-spectrum method is used to estimate and correct the ionospheric artifacts in the InSAR results. This letter shows that the long-wavelength ionospheric artifacts in the coseismic interferograms can be effectively mitigated. The slip distribution of the earthquake derived from the interferograms corrected for the ionospheric artifacts is presented. The slip distribution pattern and the magnitude of the slip are significantly refined after correcting the ionospheric artifacts.