EQUIVALENT VERIFICATION OF THE EFFECT OF THE IONOSPHERIC FARADAY ROTATION ON GEO SAR IMAGING BY FERRITE

Abstract

In geosynchronous earth orbit synthetic aperture radar (GEO SAR) working system, the radar signal travelling through the atmosphere is sensitive to the ionosphere. One of the effects is the Faraday rotation under geomagnetic field, which is similar to the phenomenon when the signal traveling through a ferrite medium. So based on the theoretical inference, we semi-physically simulate Faraday rotation of the ionosphere with that of the ferrite in the ground, which is one of the experiments of the ground railway prototype testing for GEO SAR system. The measurements of a mountain without ionospheric Faraday rotation and under the equivalent Faraday rotation of ionosphere are given experimentally. Imaging studies show that the influence of the ionosphere Faraday rotation on the distributed targets imaging is not visually obvious. Our work provides experimental basis for the GEO SAR to successfully image on the satellite.