Innovative Techniques for the Retrieval of Earth’s Surface and Atmosphere Geophysical Parameters: Spaceborne Infrared/Microwave Combined Analyses

With the advent of the first satellites for Earth Observation: Landsat-1 in July 1972 and ERS-1 in May 1991, the discipline of environmental remote sensing has become, over time, increasingly fundamental for the study of phenomena characterizing the planet Earth. The goal of environmental remote sensing is to perform detailed analyses and to monitor the temporal evolution of different physical phenomena, exploiting the mechanisms of interaction between the objects that are present in an observed scene and the electromagnetic radiation detected by sensors, placed at a distance from the scene, operating at different frequencies. The analyzed physical phenomena are those related to climate change, weather forecasts, global ocean circulation, greenhouse gas profiling, earthquakes, volcanic eruptions, soil subsidence, and the effects of rapid urbanization processes. Generally, remote sensing sensors are of two primary types: active and passive. Active sensors use their own source of electromagnetic radiation to illuminate and analyze an area of interest. An active sensor emits radiation in the direction of the area to be investigated and then detects and measures the radiation that is backscattered from the objects contained in that area. Passive sensors, on the other hand, detect natural electromagnetic radiation (e.g., from the Sun in the visible band and the Earth in the infrared and microwave bands) emitted or reflected by the object contained in the observed scene. The scientific community has dedicated many resources to developing techniques to estimate, study and analyze Earth’s geophysical parameters. These techniques differ for active and passive sensors because they depend strictly on the type of the measured physical quantity. In my P.h.D. work, inversion techniques for estimating Earth’s surface and atmosphere geophysical parameters will be addressed, emphasizing methods based on machine learning (ML). In particular, the study of cloud microphysics and the characterization of Earth’s surface changes phenomenon are the critical points of this work

Interferometric Synthetic Aperture Radar (InSAR) for Fine-resolution Basal Ice Sheet Imaging

This dissertation work was to examine the feasibility of InSAR through the ice sheets to create a fine resolution basal topography map and extraction of basal composition. InSAR was shown to be possible through the ice sheet, using data collected by the MCRDS radar around the NEEM drill site. Reflectivity maps were generated leading to the possibility of extracting useful basal composition data. Extraction of basal composition information was examined including estimating the roughness of basal topography and removing the effects of local slope

Doctor of Philosophy

dissertationThe wireless radio channel is typically thought of as a means to move information from transmitter to receiver, but the radio channel can also be used to detect changes in the environment of the radio link. This dissertation is focused on the measurements we can make at the physical layer of wireless networks, and how we can use those measurements to obtain information about the locations of transceivers and people. The first contribution of this work is the development and testing of an open source, 802.11b sounder and receiver, which is capable of decoding packets and using them to estimate the channel impulse response (CIR) of a radio link at a fraction of the cost of traditional channel sounders. This receiver improves on previous implementations by performing optimized matched filtering on the field-programmable gate array (FPGA) of the Universal Software Radio Peripheral (USRP), allowing it to operate at full bandwidth. The second contribution of this work is an extensive experimental evaluation of a technology called location distinction, i.e., the ability to identify changes in radio transceiver position, via CIR measurements. Previous location distinction work has focused on single-input single-output (SISO) radio links. We extend this work to the context of multiple-input multiple-output (MIMO) radio links, and study system design trade-offs which affect the performance of MIMO location distinction. The third contribution of this work introduces the "exploiting radio windows" (ERW) attack, in which an attacker outside of a building surreptitiously uses the transmissions of an otherwise secure wireless network inside of the building to infer location information about people inside the building. This is possible because of the relative transparency of external walls to radio transmissions. The final contribution of this dissertation is a feasibility study for building a rapidly deployable radio tomographic (RTI) imaging system for special operations forces (SOF). We show that it is possible to obtain valuable tracking information using as few as 10 radios over a single floor of a typical suburban home, even without precise radio location measurements

FMCW Signals for Radar Imaging and Channel Sounding

A linear / stepped frequency modulated continuous wave (FMCW) signal has for a long time been used in radar and channel sounding. A novel FMCW waveform known as “Gated FMCW” signal is proposed in this thesis for the suppression of strong undesired signals in microwave radar applications, such as: through-the-wall, ground penetrating, and medical imaging radar. In these applications the crosstalk signal between antennas and the reflections form the early interface (wall, ground surface, or skin respectively) are much stronger in magnitude compared to the backscattered signal from the target. Consequently, if not suppressed they overshadow the target’s return making detection a difficult task. Moreover, these strong unwanted reflections limit the radar’s dynamic range and might saturate or block the receiver causing the reflection from actual targets (especially targets with low radar cross section) to appear as noise. The effectiveness of the proposed waveform as a suppression technique was investigated in various radar scenarios, through numerical simulations and experiments. Comparisons of the radar images obtained for the radar system operating with the standard linear FMCW signal and with the proposed Gated FMCW waveform are also made. In addition to the radar work the application of FMCW signals to radio propagation measurements and channel characterisation in the 60 GHz and 2-6 GHz frequency bands in indoor and outdoor environments is described. The data are used to predict the bit error rate performance of the in-house built measurement based channel simulator and the results are compared with the theoretical multipath channel simulator available in Matlab

Radar Imaging in Challenging Scenarios from Smart and Flexible Platforms

undefine

Radar Technology

In this book “Radar Technology”, the chapters are divided into four main topic areas: Topic area 1: “Radar Systems” consists of chapters which treat whole radar systems, environment and target functional chain. Topic area 2: “Radar Applications” shows various applications of radar systems, including meteorological radars, ground penetrating radars and glaciology. Topic area 3: “Radar Functional Chain and Signal Processing” describes several aspects of the radar signal processing. From parameter extraction, target detection over tracking and classification technologies. Topic area 4: “Radar Subsystems and Components” consists of design technology of radar subsystem components like antenna design or waveform design

Application of advanced technology to space automation

Automated operations in space provide the key to optimized mission design and data acquisition at minimum cost for the future. The results of this study strongly accentuate this statement and should provide further incentive for immediate development of specific automtion technology as defined herein. Essential automation technology requirements were identified for future programs. The study was undertaken to address the future role of automation in the space program, the potential benefits to be derived, and the technology efforts that should be directed toward obtaining these benefits