Pulse-limited Radar Altimeter Research Articles

Inversion of Deflection of the Vertical in the South China Sea Using ICESat-2 Sea Surface Height Data

The traditional altimetry satellites based on pulse-limited radar altimeter only calculate along-track deflection of the vertical (DOV), which results in poorer precision of the prime vertical component than that of the meridian component and limits the precision of the marine gravity field inversion. We expect an improvement in the higher precision prime vertical component using the Ice, Cloud and land Elevation Satellite 2 (ICESat-2) sea surface height (SSH) data. In this paper, the 2′ × 2′ gridded DOVs derived from along-beam DOVs, cross-beam DOVs, and joint along-cross beam DOVs in the South China Sea (SCS; 0°–23°N, 103°–120°E) are calculated with the weighted least squares method, respectively. The inverse Vening–Meinesz (IVM) formula is applied to derive 2′ × 2′ gravity anomalies over the SCS from ICESat-2-derived gridded DOVs. In addition, the XGM2019e_2159-DOV and SIO V31.1-DOV models are used to assess the precision of the gridded DOVs. The XGM2019e_2159-GRA, SIO V31.1-GRA models, and ship-borne gravity anomalies are also adopted to evaluate the quality of gravity anomalies. The results show that the gridded DOVs calculated by the joint along-cross beam DOVs have the highest precision among the three gridded DOVs determined by ICESat-2. The precision of difference between gravity anomalies derived from the joint along-cross beam DOV and the above verification data are higher than those derived from the along-beam and cross-beam DOVs. We conclude that the joint along-cross beam DOV can effectively improve the precision of the gridded DOV, which is conducive to the inversion of a high-precision marine gravity field.

CryoSat-2 Significant Wave Height in Polar Oceans Derived Using a Semi-Analytical Model of Synthetic Aperture Radar 2011–2019

This paper documents the retrieval of significant ocean surface wave heights in the Arctic Ocean from CryoSat-2 data. We use a semi-analytical model for an idealised synthetic aperture satellite radar or pulse-limited radar altimeter echo power. We develop a processing methodology that specifically considers both the Synthetic Aperture and Pulse Limited modes of the radar that change close to the sea ice edge within the Arctic Ocean. All CryoSat-2 echoes to date were matched by our idealised echo revealing wave heights over the period 2011–2019. Our retrieved data were contrasted to existing processing of CryoSat-2 data and wave model data, showing the improved fidelity and accuracy of the semi-analytical echo power model and the newly developed processing methods. We contrasted our data to in situ wave buoy measurements, showing improved data retrievals in seasonal sea ice covered seas. We have shown the importance of directly considering the correct satellite mode of operation in the Arctic Ocean where SAR is the dominant operating mode. Our new data are of specific use for wave model validation close to the sea ice edge and is available at the link in the data availability statement.

Multi-peak Retracking of CryoSat-2 SARIn Waveforms Over Arctic Sea Ice

CryoSat-2 (CS2) is the first mission equipped with a pulse-limited radar altimeter capable of operating in Synthetic Aperture Radar (SAR) Interferometric (SARIn) mode. Over ice sheets and ice caps, CS2 SARIn data have been used to retrieve surface elevations over an across-track ground “swath.” This work demonstrates that retracking multiple coherent peaks of CS2 SARIn waveforms, in combination with the interferometric phase, enables to obtain more than one valid height estimate from single SARIn waveforms over Arctic sea ice. For some SARIn waveforms, the scattering from sea ice at the satellite nadir is successfully separated from returns originating from off-nadir leads. An average bias of -1.8 cm is found for absolute sea ice elevations when using a 50% threshold retracker. It is shown that including multiple SARIn peaks and the associated phase difference in the processing does not introduce any bias on the average sea ice freeboard heights compared with the estimates from regular SAR processing schemes, while significantly increasing the number of valid sea surface height retrievals (+55%) and the number of freeboard estimates in the coastal domain and in multi-year ice regions (~3 times). This results in an average ~34% reduction of the gridded random freeboard uncertainty, corresponding to a ~20% reduction of the gridded total sea ice thickness uncertainty. The results of this work show that SARIn acquisitions over Arctic sea ice provide improved spatial coverage and denser sampling of sea level and sea ice freeboard compared with the SAR mode, with accuracy being largely driven by the retracking algorithm.

Effects of Interferometric Radar Altimeter Errors on Marine Gravity Field Inversion.

The traditional altimetry satellite, which is based on pulse-limited radar altimeter, only measures ocean surface heights along tracks; hence, leads to poorer accuracy in the east component of the vertical deflections compared to the north component, which in turn limits the final accuracy of the marine gravity field inversion. Wide-swath altimetry using radar interferometry can measure ocean surface heights in two dimensions and, thus, can be used to compute vertical deflections in an arbitrary direction with the same accuracy. This paper aims to investigate the impact of Interferometric Radar Altimeter (InRA) errors on gravity field inversion. The error propagation between gravity anomalies and InRA measurements is analyzed, and formulas of their relationship are given. By giving a group of possible InRA parameters, numerical simulations are conducted to analyze the accuracy of gravity anomaly inversion. The results show that the accuracy of the gravity anomalies is mainly influenced by the phase errors of InRA; and the errors of gravity anomalies have a linear approximation relationship with the phase errors. The results also show that the east component of the vertical deflections has almost the same accuracy as the north component.

Analysis of Sentinel-3 SAR altimetry waveform retracking algorithms for deriving temporally consistent water levels over ice-covered lakes

Satellite radar altimetry has been widely used in the monitoring of water levels of lakes, rivers and wetlands in the past decades. The conventional pulse-limited radar altimeters have a relatively large ground footprint, which limits their capability to retrieve surface elevation information over small and medium-sized water bodies. A new generation of satellite radar altimeter system, a dual-frequency SAR radar altimeter (SRAL) onboard the Copernicus Sentinel-3 satellite, has produced densely sampled elevation measurements with a smaller footprint for the Earth's surfaces since June 2016, owing to the Delay-Doppler processing technique. Four standard SRAL SAR altimetry waveform retracking algorithms (known as retrackers) have been designed to retrieve elevation measurements for different types of surfaces: Ice-Sheet retracker for polar ice sheets, SAMOSA-3 retracker for open ocean and coastal zones, OCOG retracker for sea-ice margins, and Sea-Ice retracker for sea ice. In this research, we evaluated the performances of the Sentinel-3 SRAL SAR altimetry retrackers over lakes, particularly over seasonally ice-covered lakes in one hydrological cycle. For 15 lakes and reservoirs with different sizes and at varying latitudes in the northern hemisphere, we compared the lake water levels estimated by each of standard SRAL SAR retrackers against in-situ water level measurements for different seasons (a full hydrologic cycle) during 2016–2017. Our evaluation shows that Sea-Ice retracker was unable to provide continuous estimates of lake water levels, as a result of the high rate of missing data. Although the precision and relative accuracy of lake water level estimates from these three standard SRAL SAR retrackers are similar, the SAMOSA-3 retracker has the least bias in comparison with ground-based gauge measurements. When the lakes in the mid- and high-latitude regions were covered by ice in the winter season, these three standard SAR retrackers generated erroneous lake water level measurements, significantly lower than the true lake water levels recorded by in-situ gauge stations. The measurement errors of these three standard retrackers increase with the growth of the lake ice thickness. To address the negative effect of the seasonal ice cover, we developed a new bimodal correction algorithm. We demonstrate that our bimodal correction algorithm can retrieve the ice thickness and reliably estimate water levels for the ice-covered lakes in winter, hence enabling the generation of temporally consistent lake water level measurements throughout all seasons for lake hydrological analysis.

Compensating Changes in the Penetration Depth of Pulse-Limited Radar Altimetry Over the Greenland Ice Sheet

Changes in firn properties affect the shape of pulse-limited radar altimeter echoes acquired over the polar ice sheets. We apply a waveform deconvolution model to CryoSat-2 low-resolution mode echoes to determine the depth distribution of radar backscattering across the Greenland Ice Sheet. The deconvolution allows us to calculate the relative contributions of surface and volume scattering and the effective penetration depth of the radar echoes into the snowpack. The most prominent signal is associated with the extreme surface melting of summer 2012, which resulted in a shift of the dominant radar scattering horizon toward the snow surface in the accumulation zone. At locations above 2000 m, the average penetration depth in July 2012 (prior to the melt event) was 3.79 ± 1.12 m. Following the melt event, there was an abrupt reduction in the average penetration depth across the same region to 1.45 ± 0.94 m. The average penetration depth then gradually increased to 3.28 ± 1.13 m by the end of 2017, as fresh snow accumulated on the ice sheet surface. Although the variation in penetration is evident in surface height estimates derived from the CryoSat-2 echoes, the magnitude of the effect is reduced by waveform retracking. Using airborne laser altimeter data recorded over the same time period, we show that the penetration variation can be compensated effectively by incorporating the deconvolution penetration depth into the surface height retrieval.

Fully Focused SAR Altimetry: Theory and Applications

In this paper, we introduce the concept, develop the theory, and demonstrate the advantages of fully focused coherent processing of pulse echoes from a nadir-looking pulse-limited radar altimeter. This process, similar to synthetic aperture radar (SAR) imaging systems, reduces the along-track resolution down to the theoretical limit equal to half the antenna length. We call this the fully focused SAR (FF-SAR) altimetry processing. The technique is directly applicable to SAR altimetry missions such as CryoSat-2, Sentinel-3, or Sentinel-6/Jason-CS. The footprint of an FF-SAR altimeter measurement is a narrow strip on the surface, which is pulse limited across track and SAR focused along track. Despite the asymmetry of the altimeter footprint, the fully focused technique may be useful for applications in which one needs to separate specific targets within highly heterogeneous scenes, such as in the case of sea ice lead detection, hydrology, and coastal altimetry applications. In addition, over rough homogeneous surfaces, such as the ocean or ice sheets, the improved multilooking capability of FF-SAR leads to a significant increase in the effective number of looks with respect to the delay/Doppler processing, resulting in better geophysical parameter estimation. The proposed processing technique was verified by processing full bit rate CryoSat-2 SAR mode data over the Svalbard transponder. Hydrology, sea ice, and open ocean applications are also demonstrated in this paper, showing the improvement of this technique with respect to conventional and delay/Doppler altimetry.

An Improved Method of Retrieving Sea Surface Wind Speed Based on a Four-Layer Medium Model at High Sea States

Considering about the effect of whitecaps and foams on pulse-limited Radar Altimeters, an improved algorithm of retrieving sea surface wind speed is proposed in this paper. Firstly, a four-layer dielectric model is established in order to simulate an air-sea interface. Secondly, the microwave reflectivity of a sea surface covered by spray droplets and foams at 13.5 GHz is computed based on the established model. These computed results show that the effect of spray droplets and foams in high sea state conditions shall not be negligible on retrieving sea surface wind speed. Finally, compared with the analytical algorithms proposed by Zhao and some calculated results based on a three-layer dielectric model, an improved algorithm of retrieving sea surface wind speed is presented. At a high wind speed, the improved algorithm is in a better accord with some empirical algorithms such as Brown, Young ones and et al., and also in a good agreement with ZT and other algorithms at low wind speed. This new improved algorithm will be suitable not only for low wind speed retrieval, but also for high wind speed retrieval. Better accuracy and effectiveness of wind speed retrieval can also be obtained.

Using the Interferometric Capabilities of the ESA CryoSat-2 Mission to Improve the Accuracy of Sea Ice Freeboard Retrievals

A significant source of error in the retrieval of sea ice freeboard from pulse-limited radar altimeters arises when scattering from off-nadir leads dominates the power echo causing the onboard tracker to “snag” and overestimate the two-way travel time. This range overestimate translates into an ocean elevation underestimate relative to the ice surface and an overestimate of the sea ice freeboard. We demonstrate using interferometric CryoSat-2 data that it is possible to infer the across-track angle of return to off-nadir leads and their location in the CryoSat-2 footprint and hence correct for the associated range error for the first time. It is found that specular scattering from leads can dominate the radar echo some 1530 m off nadir. Over the region studied, the mean ocean elevation bias is closely associated with the “pulse peakiness” (PP) parameter used for identifying specular waveforms. Considering only the most specular waveforms, the elevation bias was measured to be -1.21 ±0.93 cm. However, lowering the PP threshold includes lower power waveforms originating from higher off-nadir angles, and the elevation bias becomes -4.06 ±1.66 cm. Unaccounted for, these biases represent an ~ 10-40-cm overestimate in ice thickness. Despite the relatively large error on the mean bias, correcting for off-nadir ranging contributes only a small amount to the elevation uncertainty when combined with range and orbit determination uncertainties. We found that making use of CryoSat-2's interferometric mode over sea ice ultimately decreases the uncertainty on the area-averaged ocean elevation by allowing the inclusion of more waveforms in the analysis.

Exploring the Benefits of Using CryoSat-2's Cross-Track Interferometry to Improve the Resolution of Multisatellite Mesoscale Fields

Abstract Sea surface height (SSH) measurements provided by pulse-limited radar altimeters are one-dimensional profiles along the satellite's nadir track, with no information whatsoever in the cross-track direction. The anisotropy of resulting SSH profiles is the most limiting factor of mesoscale SSH maps that merge the 1D profiles. This paper explores the potential of the cross-track slope derived from the Cryosphere Satellite-2 (CryoSat-2)'s synthetic aperture radar interferometry (SARin) mode to increase the resolution of mesoscale fields in the cross-track direction. Through idealized 1D simulations, this study shows that it is possible to exploit the dual SARin measurement (cross-track slope and SSH profile) in order to constrain mesoscale mapping in the cross-track direction. An error-free SSH slope allows a single SARin instrument to recover almost as much SSH variance as two coordinated altimeters. Noise-corrupted slopes can also be exploited to improve the mapping, and a breakthrough is observed for SARin errors ranging from 1 to 5 μrad for 150-km-radius features in strong currents, and 0.1–0.5 μrad for global mesoscale. Although only limited experiments might be possible with the error level of current CryoSat-2 data, this paper shows the potential of the SAR interferometry technology to reduce the anisotropy of altimeter measurements if the SARin error is significantly reduced in the future, and in particular in the context of a prospective SARin demonstrator optimized for oceanography.

Radar altimeter gate tracking: theory and extension

The range gate tracking algorithms in the United States' satellite radar altimeters over the past 20 years all use the same waveform estimators: uniformly weighted gates. The generic algorithm is based on a nested family of range intervals, within which the average reflected power is computed. This choice of gate weighting is guided by matching the gate properties to the shape of the flat surface impulse response of the scattering surface. For the case of a conventional, pulse-limited radar altimeter, the flat surface impulse response is a step function, for which uniformly weighted gates are appropriate. In the more general case, nonuniform weights are required. This paper reviews the theory behind the gate tracking algorithm as applied to conventional altimeters and extends this basic method to the recently proposed delay/Doppler altimeter whose impulse response does not have a step-function shape. Furthermore, it is shown that the definition of the tracking gates for either type of altimeter can be modified to account for the impact of the radar antenna beampattern on the altimeter waveform.

The effect of whitecaps and foam on wind speed extraction with a pulse limited radar altimeter

The effect of whitecaps and foam on wind speed extraction with a pulse limited radar altimeter has been studied using a specular point model. By modelling foam and water as a two-layer media, we have investigated the changes in reflectivity as a function of thickness using electro-magnetic field theory. Our analysis indicated a change of reflectivity from a value of 0.617 at 13.9 GHz normal incidence to a value of 0.10 for a foam thickness of less than 1 cm. The values of reflectivity computed from a two-layer model compared fairly well with these derived using an emissivity model.The modified specular point model gave an improved relationship between σo and wind speed in comparison to Brown’s model. The Seasat altimeter’s data analysis over the Arabian sea and the Bay of Bengal gave an rms difference of 2.2 m/sec in wind speed retrieval using the present modified model and Brown’s model.

Ocean wave heights measured by a high resolution pulse-limited radar altimeter

Radar measurements of wave height are compared with independent measurements made during the JONSWAP-2 experiment by Waverider and pitch-roll buoys, a shipborne wave recorder and a laser profilometer. The radar data were recorded by a Naval Research Laboratory (NRL) nanosecond-pulse X-band radar altimeter flown in a NASA C-54 aircraft at 3-km altitude under various wind and sea conditions. Averages of 800 pulses of the pulse-limited altimeter data were used to calculate maximum-likelihood estimates of significant wave height (SWH) and skewness of the sea-surface height distribution. The mean values of the radar-estimated SWH were in good agreement with the other measurements. The standard deviation of the values of the radar measurements was typically 10% of the average wave height. A two-dimensional computer simulation of the sea surface indicates that the major portion of the observed standard deviation is attributable to the relatively small sea-surface area illuminated by the radar (125 m × 900 m) rather than to instrumental error. Increasing the number of pulses averaged reduced the variance in the estimates without changing the means. The mean value of the skewness parameter was generally near zero but the standard deviation was typically 0.25. The estimate of SWH did not change when the skewness parameter was constrained to zero.