A novel 3-D subsurface radar imaging technique

• Published in: IEEE transactions on geoscience and remote sensing Vol. 40; no. 2; pp. 443 - 452
• Main Author: Fortuny-Guasch, J.
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: New York, NY IEEE 01.02.2002; Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers; The Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers, Inc. (IEEE)
• Subjects: Antenna measurements; Apertures; Applied geophysics; Buried object detection; Dielectric constant; Dielectrics; Dispersions; Distortion; Earth sciences; Earth, ocean, space; Exact sciences and technology; Focusing; Ground penetrating radar; Internal geophysics; Landmine detection; Permittivity; Radar; Radar imaging; Radar polarimetry; Refraction; algorithms; buried features; wave refraction; accuracy; dielectric constant; corrections; imagery; three-dimensional models; wave dispersion; polarization; soils; radar methods; distortion
• ISSN: 0196-2892; 1558-0644
• DOI: 10.1109/36.992808

The problem of the formation of subsurface images using stand-off forward looking radar is by far more severe than that of forming the radar images in the free-space. A subsurface image needs to be accurately focused taking into account both the refraction and dispersion of the wavefield. This paper presents a novel imaging algorithm specially tailored for subsurface sensing. A simple and effective characterization technique for the retrieval of the dielectric permittivity is outlined. The proposed soil characterization and subsurface imaging techniques are validated experimentally. Results show that the geometric distortion in the subsurface images due to the refraction and dispersion of the wavefields is successfully corrected.