Interferometric Synthetic Aperture Radar Imagery Research Articles

Scalable and rapid building damage detection after hurricane Ian using causal Bayesian networks and InSAR imagery

Timely and accurate assessment of hurricane-induced building damage is crucial for effective post-hurricane response and recovery efforts. Recently, remote sensing technologies provide large-scale optical or Interferometric Synthetic Aperture Radar (InSAR) imagery data immediately after a disastrous event, which can be readily used to conduct rapid building damage assessment. Compared to optical satellite imageries, the Synthetic Aperture Radar can penetrate cloud cover and provide more complete spatial coverage of damaged zone in various weather conditions. However, these InSAR imageries often contain highly noisy and mixed signals induced by co-occurring or co-located building damage, flood, flood/wind-induced vegetation changes, as well as anthropogenic activities, making it challenging to extract accurate building damage information. In this paper, we introduced a causality-informed Bayesian network inference approach for rapid post-hurricane building damage detection from InSAR imagery. This approach encoded complex causal dependencies among wind, flood, building damage, and InSAR imagery using a holistic causal Bayesian network. Based on the causal Bayesian network, we further jointly inferred the large-scale unobserved building damage by fusing the information from InSAR imagery with prior physical models of flood and wind, without the need for ground truth labels. Furthermore, we validated our estimation results in a real-world devastating hurricane—the 2022 Hurricane Ian. We gathered and annotated building damage ground truth data in Lee County, Florida, and compared the introduced method’s estimation results with the ground truth and also benchmarked it against state-of-the-art models to assess the effectiveness of our proposed method. The results show that our method advances building damage assessment after hurricanes by accurately reflecting the complex dynamics between wind and flood impacts. Notably, it achieves this without the need for a ground truth label, which is a substantial step forward from traditional methods. Our model registers a 22.6% increase in the Area Under the Curve (AUC) and a 46.29% enhancement in the True Positive Rate (TPR). Moreover, it expedites the detection of building damage, cutting down processing times by up to 83.8%. These improvements mark a considerable leap in efficiency, demonstrating our method’s ability to streamline the assessment process markedly over conventional methods.

Automatic Extraction of Layover From InSAR Imagery Based on Multilayer Feature Fusion Attention Mechanism

Layover is a kind of geometric distortion in radar systems with side-look imaging, especially in mountainous and dense urban areas. It causes phase distortion and alters target characteristics in the acquired images, which directly hinders the application of radar images. In this letter, the multilayer feature fusion attention mechanism (MF2AM) is proposed to extract layover from interferometric synthetic aperture radar (InSAR) imagery automatically. First, the SAR image, the corresponding coherence map, and interferometric phases are channel-fused to enhance semantic information of layover areas. Then, the fused image is fed into MF2AM to extract the essential features of layover. Finally, the detection results are produced via MF2AM. MF2AM consists of the encoder and the decoder. The encoder contains three parts: the resnet101, attention-based atrous spatial pyramid (AASP), and the semantic embedding branch (SEB). In the decoder, step decoding is used to better fuse high- and low-level features and improve the effect of edge segmentation. To verify the proposed method, the images of millimeter wave InSAR system are used for the experiment, and the performance is compared with DeepLabV3+ and Geospatial Contextual Attention Mechanism (GCAM). The results show that the MF2AM has achieved obvious performance advantages. The average pixel accuracy and average intersection over union (IOU) are 0.9601 and 0.9310, respectively, and the average test time is only 7.97 s.

TanDEM-X multiparametric data features in sea ice classification over the Baltic sea

ABSTRACT In this study, we assess the potential of X-band Interferometric Synthetic Aperture Radar imagery for automated classification of sea ice over the Baltic Sea. A bistatic SAR scene acquired by the TanDEM-X mission over the Bothnian Bay in March of 2012 was used in the analysis. Backscatter intensity, interferometric coherence magnitude, and interferometric phase have been used as informative features in several classification experiments. Various combinations of classification features were evaluated using Maximum likelihood (ML), Random Forests (RF) and Support Vector Machine (SVM) classifiers to achieve the best possible discrimination between open water and several sea ice types (undeformed ice, ridged ice, moderately deformed ice, brash ice, thick level ice, and new ice). Adding interferometric phase and coherence-magnitude to backscatter-intensity resulted in improved overall classification performance compared to using only backscatter-intensity. The RF algorithm appeared to be slightly superior to SVM and ML due to higher overall accuracies, however, at the expense of somewhat longer processing time. The best overall accuracy (OA) for three methodologies were achieved using combination of all tested features were 71.56, 72.93, and 72.91% for ML, RF and SVM classifiers, respectively. Compared to OAs of 62.28, 66.51, and 63.05% using only backscatter intensity, this indicates strong benefit of SAR interferometry in discriminating different types of sea ice. In contrast to several earlier studies, we were particularly able to successfully discriminate open water and new ice classes.

Land Subsidence of Kanto Plain Detection Using JERS-1 SAR Interferometry

Since InSAR technique has a capability to detect a small surface elevation changes over large area, InSAR system has been used widely for good resolution mapping and other applications on various applied sciences. InSAR imagery is applied to investigate surface change and result detailed maps of contour, which help to detect disaster areas. This research is aimed to estimate the land subsidence using the differential interferometric synthetic aperture radar (InSAR). The research object is located in the west part of Japan, Kanto Plain area, where ground water actively is being extracted in quite large scale and produces centimeters of subsidence every year. Over the analyzed area, the surface deformation was detected and it was only related to subsidence process. In other words, there is no surface arising or uplift of surface. It signed by color phase changes correspond from zero to minus values.

PRECURSORY SLOPE DEFORMATION AROUND LANDSLIDE AREA DETECTED BY INSAR THROUGHOUT JAPAN

Abstract. Interferometric Synthetic Aperture Radar (InSAR) technique is able to detect a slope deformation around landslide (e.g., Singhroy et al., 2004; Une et al., 2008; Riedel and Walther, 2008; Sato et al., 2014). Geospatial Information Authority (GSI) of Japan has been performing the InSAR analysis regularly by using ALOS/PALSAR data and ALOS-2/PALSAR-2 data throughout Japan. There are a lot of small phase change sites except for crustal deformation with earthquake or volcano activity in the InSAR imagery. Most of the phase change sites are located in landslide area. We conducted field survey at the 10 sites of those phase change sites. As a result, we identified deformation of artificial structures or linear depressions caused by mass movement at the 9 sites. This result indicates that InSAR technique can detect on the continual deformation of landslide block for several years. GSI of Japan will continue to perform the InSAR analysis throughout Japan. Therefore, we will be able to observe and monitor precursory slope deformation around landslide areas throughout Japan.

PRECURSORY SLOPE DEFORMATION AROUND LANDSLIDE AREA DETECTED BY INSAR THROUGHOUT JAPAN

Interferometric Synthetic Aperture Radar (InSAR) technique is able to detect a slope deformation around landslide (e.g., Singhroy et al., 2004; Une et al., 2008; Riedel and Walther, 2008; Sato et al., 2014). Geospatial Information Authority (GSI) of Japan has been performing the InSAR analysis regularly by using ALOS/PALSAR data and ALOS-2/PALSAR-2 data throughout Japan. There are a lot of small phase change sites except for crustal deformation with earthquake or volcano activity in the InSAR imagery. Most of the phase change sites are located in landslide area. We conducted field survey at the 10 sites of those phase change sites. As a result, we identified deformation of artificial structures or linear depressions caused by mass movement at the 9 sites. This result indicates that InSAR technique can detect on the continual deformation of landslide block for several years. GSI of Japan will continue to perform the InSAR analysis throughout Japan. Therefore, we will be able to observe and monitor precursory slope deformation around landslide areas throughout Japan.

Time-Varying Elevation Change at the Centralia Coal Mine in Centralia, Washington (USA), Constrained with InSAR, ASTER, and Optical Imagery

Rapid landscape changes as a result of anthropogenic development can result in increased hazards for nearby communities, including exposure of soils to runoff, pollution, and slope collapse. Elevation changes also complicate interpretations of remote sensing datasets, such as interferometric synthetic aperture radar (InSAR), which rely on accurate digital elevation models (DEMs). In this study, we assimilate satellite-based radar and optical imagery spanning several decades to determine a time series of elevation change at the Centralia Coal Mine in Centralia, Washington. We assess the errors associated with each observation type and explore methods for reducing potential bias. By combining these datasets, we are able to characterize elevation changes resulting from coal mining operations for most of the productive lifespan of the mine. This approach can be applied to any region of rapid elevation change, provided sufficient remote sensing data are available.

Web Services for Dynamic Coloring of UAVSAR Images

QuakeSim has implemented a service-based Geographic Information System to enable users to access large amounts of Uninhabited Aerial Vehicle Synthetic Aperture Radar (UAVSAR) data through an online interface. The QuakeSim Interferometric Synthetic Aperture Radar (InSAR) profile tool calculates radar-observed displacement (from an unwrapped interferogram product) along user-specified lines. Pre-rendered thumbnails with InSAR fringe patterns are used to display interferogram and unwrapped phase images on a Google Map in the InSAR profile tool. One challenge with this tool lies in the user visually identifying regions of interest when drawing the profile line. This requires that the user correctly interpret the InSAR imagery, which currently uses fringe patterns. The mapping between pixel color and pixel value is not a one-to-one relationship from the InSAR fringe pattern, and it causes difficulty in understanding general displacement information for QuakeSim users. The goal of this work is to generate color maps that directly reflect the pixel values (displacement) as an addition to the pre-rendered images. Because of an extremely uneven distribution of pixel values on an InSAR image, a histogram-based, nonlinear color template generation algorithm is currently under development. A web service enables on-the-fly coloring of UAVSAR images with dynamically generated color templates.

The 2011 Hudson volcano eruption (Southern Andes, Chile): Pre-eruptive inflation and hotspots observed with InSAR and thermal imagery

Hudson is one of the most active volcanoes in the Southern Andes—it had one of the largest eruptions of the 20th century in 1991 (VEI = 5) and smaller eruptions in 1971 (VEI = 3), maybe 1973, and 2011 (VEI of 1-2). We use satellite-based interferometric synthetic aperture radar (InSAR) and thermal imagery to characterize the activity of Hudson between 2004 and 2011 and during the 2011 eruption. InSAR data show that the volcano inflated between 2004 and 2010 with a maximum change rate of between 2 and 3 cm/yr—about half of the deformation rate observed during a previous deformation episode from 1993–1999. Inversion for an inflating point source suggests magma accumulation beneath the SW part of the caldera at an average depth of 10 km. This inferred source is deeper than both the sources estimated for the magma chamber of the 1991 eruption (from petrology) and for the 1993–1999 deformation event. Also, the deformation from 2004–2010 is centered at a slightly different location and has a smaller volume change than that between 1993–1999—further indicating that there is either a large magma reservoir or several separate ones. While the deformation center is a few km from the eruption location near the caldera rim, the two are possibly linked since the predicted static Coloumb stress changes due to the inferred inflation source would encourage unclamping on potential faults in the caldera rim. We also analize nighttime satellite thermal images from MODIS and ASTER. While MODIS did not show any unambiguous evidence for hot spots, ASTER thermal imagery show that at least four months before the eruption there were locations with temperatures 7–8oK above background. Lahars observed by helicopter overflights on 4 March 2011 and October 2011 suggest that the hotspots may have been caused by lakes or subglacial melting. There is no InSAR data available for the months immediately preceding the eruption, but the ASTER thermal imagery results may indicate an increase in geothermal activity that could have been used to forecast the eruption.

KaRIn on SWOT: Characteristics of Near-Nadir Ka-Band Interferometric SAR Imagery

The principal instrument of the NASA/CNES wide-swath altimetry mission Surface Water and Ocean Topography (SWOT) is the Ka-band Radar Interferometer (KaRIn), a bistatic synthetic aperture radar (SAR) system operating on near-nadir swaths on both sides of the satellite track. There are limited reports on backscattering from natural surfaces at this short wavelength and particular observation geometry. Near-field backscattering measurements on water, as well as the first interferometric airborne SAR acquisitions at Ka-band covering the 0.6 °-3.9 ° incidence range of KaRIn, were therefore conducted. The experimental results confirm expected characteristics of near-nadir Ka-band interferometric SAR imagery, such as strong water/land radiometric contrast (typically in the order of 10 dB) and very high interferometric coherence on water.

Quantifying Sub-pixel Urban Impervious Surface through Fusion of Optical and InSAR Imagery

In this study, we explored the potential to improve urban impervious surface modeling and mapping with the synergistic use of optical and Interferometric Synthetic Aperture Radar (InSAR) imagery. We used a Classification and Regression Tree (CART)-based approach to test the feasibility and accuracy of quantifying Impervious Surface Percentage (ISP) using four spectral bands of SPOT 5 high-resolution geometric (HRG) imagery and three parameters derived from the European Remote Sensing (ERS)-2 Single Look Complex (SLC) SAR image pair. Validated by an independent ISP reference dataset derived from the 33 cm-resolution digital aerial photographs, results show that the addition of InSAR data reduced the ISP modeling error rate from 15.5% to 12.9% and increased the correlation coefficient from 0.71 to 0.77. Spatially, the improvement is especially noted in areas of vacant land and bare ground, which were incorrectly mapped as urban impervious surfaces when using the optical remote sensing data. In addition, the accuracy of ISP prediction using InSAR images alone is only marginally less than that obtained by using SPOT imagery. The finding indicates the potential of using InSAR data for frequent monitoring of urban settings located in cloud-prone areas.

Complex Faulting Associated with the 22 December 2003 Mw 6.5 San Simeon, California, Earthquake, Aftershocks, and Postseismic Surface Deformation

We use data from two seismic networks and satellite interferometric synthetic aperture radar (InSAR) imagery to characterize the 22 December 2003 M w 6.5 San Simeon earthquake sequence. Absolute locations for the mainshock and nearly 10,000 aftershocks were determined using a new three-dimensional (3D) seismic velocity model; relative locations were obtained using double difference. The mainshock location found using the 3D velocity model is 35.704° N, 121.096° W at a depth of 9.7±0.7 km. The aftershocks concentrate at the northwest and southeast parts of the aftershock zone, between the mapped traces of the Oceanic and Nacimiento fault zones. The northwest end of the mainshock rupture, as defined by the aftershocks, projects from the mainshock hypocenter to the surface a few kilometers west of the mapped trace of the Oceanic fault, near the Santa Lucia Range front and the >5 mm postseismic InSAR imagery contour. The Oceanic fault in this area, as mapped by Hall (1991), is therefore probably a second-order synthetic thrust or reverse fault that splays upward from the main seismogenic fault at depth. The southeast end of the rupture projects closer to the mapped Oceanic fault trace, suggesting much of the slip was along this fault, or at a minimum is accommodating much of the postseismic deformation. InSAR imagery shows ∼72 mm of postseismic uplift in the vicinity of maximum coseismic slip in the central section of the rupture, and ∼48 and ∼45 mm at the northwest and southeast end of the aftershock zone, respectively. From these observations, we model a ∼30-km-long northwest-trending northeast-dipping mainshock rupture surface—called the mainthrust—which is likely the Oceanic fault at depth, a ∼10-km-long southwest-dipping backthrust parallel to the mainthrust near the hypocenter, several smaller southwest-dipping structures in the southeast, and perhaps additional northeast-dipping or subvertical structures southeast of the mainshock plane. Discontinuous backthrust features opposite the mainthrust in the southeast part of the aftershock zone may offset the relic Nacimiento fault zone at depth. The InSAR data image surface deformation associated with both aseismic slip and aftershock production on the mainthrust and the backthrusts at the northwest and southeast ends of the aftershock zone. The well-defined mainthrust at the latitude of the epicenter and antithetic backthrust illuminated by the aftershock zone indicate uplift of the Santa Lucia Range as a popup block; aftershocks in the southeast part of the zone also indicate a popup block, but it is less well defined. The absence of backthrust features in the central part of the zone suggests range-front uplift by fault-propagation folding, or backthrusts in the central part were not activated during the mainshock.

Monitoring and characterizing natural hazards with satellite InSAR imagery

Interferometric synthetic aperture radar (InSAR) provides an all-weather imaging capability for measuring ground-surface deformation and inferring changes in land surface characteristics. InSAR enables scientists to monitor and characterize hazards posed by volcanic, seismic, and hydrogeologic processes, by landslides and wildfires, and by human activities such as mining and fluid extraction or injection. Measuring how a volcano's surface deforms before, during, and after eruptions provides essential information about magma dynamics and a basis for mitigating volcanic hazards. Measuring spatial and temporal patterns of surface deformation in seismically active regions is extraordinarily useful for understanding rupture dynamics and estimating seismic risks. Measuring how landslides develop and activate is a prerequisite to minimizing associated hazards. Mapping surface subsidence or uplift related to extraction or injection of fluids during exploitation of groundwater aquifers or petroleum reservoirs provides fundamental data on aquifer or reservoir properties and improves our ability to mitigate undesired consequences. Monitoring dynamic water-level changes in wetlands improves hydrological modeling predictions and the assessment of future flood impacts. In addition, InSAR imagery can provide near-real-time estimates of fire scar extents and fire severity for wildfire management and control. All-weather satellite radar imagery is critical for studying various natural processes and is playing an increasingly important role in understanding and forecasting natural hazards.

Detection of process‐related changes in plant patterns at extended spatial scales during early dryland desertification

AbstractArid and semiarid shrublands occupy extensive land areas over the world, are susceptible to desertification by anthropic use and can contribute to regional climate change. These prompt the interest to monitor and evaluate these lands adequately in order to detect early stages of degradation. Evaluation topics must refer to biology‐relevant characteristics of these systems, while simultaneously satisfying sampling consistency over extended landscape areas. We present an analysis of process‐relevant parameters related to changes in the spatial arrangement of the plant canopy of shrublands inferred from high‐resolution panchromatic aerial photos and Interferometric Synthetic Aperture Radar imagery. We obtained low‐altitude images systematically located along several gradients of land‐use intensity in a Patagonian Monte shrubland in Argentina. Images were digitized to spatial resolutions ranging from 0.09 to 0.72 m (pixel size) and the average values and an‐isotropic characteristics of the plant canopy patterns were quantified by means of a Fourier metric. We used radar‐derived imagery to overlay the panchromatic images on a digital elevation model in order to study the correspondence of potential runoff patterns and the spatial arrangement of plants. We related an‐isotropic features of the plant canopy images to the prevailing wind regime. Observed trends were further interpreted on the basis of a spatial‐explicit simulation model describing the dynamics of the main functional groups in the plant community. We conclude that early stages of anthropic‐driven dryland degradation in the Patagonian Monte can be characterized by the incipient un‐coupling of spatial vegetation patterns from those of runoff at a landscape scale, and a progressive coupling to the spatial pattern of the wind regime. The method and metrics we present can be used to quantify early desertification changes in other similar drylands at extended spatial scales.

Use of time–subsidence data during pumping to characterize specific storage and hydraulic conductivity of semi-confining units

A new graphical technique is developed that takes advantage of time–subsidence data collected from either traditional extensometer installations or from newer technologies such as fixed-station global positioning systems or interferometric synthetic aperture radar imagery, to accurately estimate storage properties of the aquifer and vertical hydraulic conductivity of semi-confining units. Semi-log plots of time–compaction data are highly diagnostic with the straight-line portion of the plot reflecting the specific storage of the semi-confining unit. Calculation of compaction during one-log cycle of time from these plots can be used in a simple analytical expression based on the Cooper–Jacob technique to accurately calculate specific storage of the semi-confining units. In addition, these semi-log plots can be used to identify when the pressure transient has migrated through the confining layer into the unpumped aquifer, precluding the need for additional piezometers within the unpumped aquifer or within the semi-confining units as is necessary in the Neuman and Witherspoon method. Numerical simulations are used to evaluate the accuracy of the new technique. The technique was applied to time–drawdown and time–compaction data collected near Franklin Virginia, within the Potomac aquifers of the Coastal Plain, and shows that the method can be easily applied to estimate the inelastic skeletal specific storage of this aquifer system.

Tectonic contraction across Los Angeles after removal of groundwater pumping effects.

After the 1987 Whittier Narrows and 1994 Northridge earthquakes revealed that blind thrust faults represent a significant threat to metropolitan Los Angeles, a network of 250 continuously recording global positioning system (GPS) stations was deployed to monitor displacements associated with deep slip on both blind and surface faults. Here we augment this GPS data with interferometric synthetic aperture radar imagery to take into account the deformation associated with groundwater pumping and strike-slip faulting. After removing these non-tectonic signals, we are left with 4.4 mm yr-1 of uniaxial contraction across the Los Angeles basin, oriented N 36 degrees E (perpendicular to the major strike-slip faults in the area). This indicates that the contraction is primarily accommodated on thrust faults rather than on the northeast-trending strike-slip faults. We have found that widespread groundwater and oil pumping obscures and in some cases mimics the tectonic signals expected from the blind thrust faults. In the 40-km-long Santa Ana basin, groundwater withdrawal and re-injection produces 12 mm yr-1 of long-term subsidence, accompanied by an unprecedented seasonal oscillation of 55 mm in the vertical direction and 7 mm horizontally.

Correlation of oceanographic signatures appearing in synthetic aperture radar and interferometric synthetic aperture radar imagery with in situ measurements

Synthetic aperture radar (SAR) imagery collected over the continental shelf near Cape Hatteras, N. C., is analyzed in conjunction with shipboard hydrographic and current measurements. The SAR measurements were made over a 2‐hour period on June 20, 1993, in both standard mapping mode and interferometric synthetic aperture radar (INSAR) mode from a NASA DC‐8 aircraft as part of the High‐Resolution Remote Sensing Experiment. In situ currents were measured using a surface‐towed acoustic Doppler current profiler (ADCP). The measurements were made near the end of a period of Gulf Stream incursion onto the shelf as detected using a shore‐based HF radar. Winds were southwesterly at 4–6 m s−1. Long, curvilinear SAR signatures, resembling earlier SEASAT observations made in the same area, are shown to correspond to narrow, shallow fronts separating water masses that increase in surface density with distance offshore. Across‐front changes in surface current inferred from the INSAR data are consistent with 2‐m‐depth currents measured by the ADCP over scales of tens of meters. Thus frontal current gradients measured by INSAR reflect real changes in surface current and are not due to biases induced by changes in the surface‐wave spectrum. This lends support to the detailed INSAR surface maps derived by Graber et al. [1996]. An east‐west salinity front having the largest observed surface density and current gradient is corrugated on length scales up to the local Rossby radius of deformation and translates southward between successive images. In data from the longer radar wavelengths the salinity front appears as a dark band downwind of a bright signature, and this is interpreted as a region where Bragg‐scale waves regenerate following their dissipation in the frontal region. In addition to the fronts the imagery shows closely spaced packets of southward propagating ocean internal waves occurring in the strongly stratified inshore water mass. This case study further serves to emphasize the potential of SAR imagery for study of a wide range of shelf processes.

Interferometric SAR imagery of a monochromatic ocean wave in the presence of the real aperture radar modulation

Abstract The model which allows one to simulate the Synthetic Aperture Radar (SAR) and the along track Interferometric SAR (INSAR) imagery of a monochromatic ocean wave is presented. The model accounts for the effects of the real aperture radar (RAR) modulation of the radar backscatter cross-section. The comparison of the SAR and the INSAR imagery of the wave system under consideration is carried out and the performance of the two imaging systems is studied under various operational conditions. The results of the study indicate that the interferometric SAR is less sensitive to the RAR modulation as compared lo the regular SAR. This fact further augments the assertion that INSAR has considerable advantages over SAR in its potential of providing quantitative information about the ocean wave lengths, directions and amplitudes

Simulation of an interferometric synthetic aperture radar imagery of an ocean system consisting of a current and a monochromatic wave

A model which simulates azimuthal imaging of a monochromatic ocean wave and current by an interferometric synthetic aperture radar (INSAR) is developed. The model allows one to obtain simulation of a regular synthetic aperture radar (SAR) as a particular case. The effects of velocity bunching and scanning distortion, as well as the dependence of the output on wave propagation direction, are considered. SAR and INSAR imaging of a monochromatic wave is compared both qualitatively and quantitatively for a wide range of governing parameters. Analytical expressions for both SAR and INSAR outputs were obtained for small values of the velocity‐bunching parameter. The accuracy of these analytical approximations was checked numerically.

Energy density directional spectra of a nearshore wave field measured by interferometric synthetic aperture radar

The nearshore wave field within Monterey Bay, California, is studied using remote sensing imaging by an interferometric synthetic aperture radar (INSAR) and simultaneous ground‐based measurements. It is shown that INSAR imagery of the ocean surface offers some advantages over conventional synthetic aperture radar. Because of the direct imaging mechanism of INSAR, quantitative information about the complicated wave field can be obtained. The INSAR‐derived directional energy density spectra and the corresponding ground‐based spectra compare well.