APRSAF-18

Evolution of SAR Satellite for Agriculture Applications

Hiroyuki Inahata and Hiroshi Koyama

Mitsubishi Electric Corporation 7 December, 2011

Table of Contents 1. Company Profile 2. MELCO Capability in Earth Observation Field 3. SAR Applications for Agriculture 4. SAR Sensor Hardware 5. Conclusions

1. Company Profile
Space Related Facilities in Japan Consolidated Consolidated Net Net Sales Sales JPY JPY 3,645 3,645 billion(US$43.9B) billion(US$43.9B) Employee Employee 114,443 114,443
MELCOs Facility
JAXA Facility

Communication Systems Center (Ground Segment) Os ak a

Osaka

kyo To

Head Office

Sag amih a
a ur ak m Ka

ra

Advanced Technology R&D Center

un a Of

Tanegasima

Sagami Plant under Kamakura Works (Composite Material)

JAXA Tanegashima Space Center

Information Technology R&D Center

Kamakura Works (Space Segment)

Satellite Operation Center (at Kamakura Works)

1. Company Profile
Heritages in Past Space Program

Participated in over 450 satellites worldwide

As of August. 2011

Over 50 prime contracts including

2009

- 21 communication satellites - 25 observation satellites

2. MELCO Capability in Earth Observation Field

MELCO heritages in Earth Observation Satellite

MELCO has experiences to develop & integrated various kinds of observation satellites such as large multi-mission platform(ADEOS1/2), high-resolution imaging satellite (ALOS-2:Synthetic Aperture RadarALOS-3:Optical).
Weight 4.0 t 1990 2000
Under Development

2010

3.0 t

ADEOS(1996 Multi mission

JAXA

ADEOS-II(2002)
JAXA

Multi mission

MTSAT-22006) Meteorological

2.0 t

GEO LEO

Himawari-8 2014 Himawari-9 2016 Meteorological ALOS-2(2013) L-band SAR

JAXA

1.0 t JERS-1(1992)
JAXA/METI

ALOS-3 JAXA (under planning) Optical SOLAR-B(2006)

JAXA

GOSAT(2009)
JAXA

0.5t

L-band SAR

Science

Green House Gas

SLATS(2013) Space Environment & Optical

2. MELCO Capability in Earth Observation Field

MELCO heritages in Observation Sensors

MELCO has been developing earth observation sensors such as high-resolution & multi band imaging sensor (Synthetic Aperture Radar, Optical)
1990 2000
Under Development

2010

Passive
total 11
JAXA METI/JAROS

AVNIR

ASTER/SWIR EOS-AM1(1999)

AVNIR-2

JAXA

NAOJ/JAXA

Solar Telescope SOLAR-B(2006)

CIRCIR)

JAXA

OPS (planned)

Optical
Active
total 3

ADEOS(1996

ALOS(2006) MDS-2)

ALOS-3(Planned) ALOS-3(2014) GOSAT-2(TBD)

GEO
JAXA

LEO

Optical Data Relay &Tracking equipment

ELISE

other optical equipment (TBD)

Passive
total 6
JAXA JAXA JAXA JAXA

AMSR JERS-1(1992)

AMSR-E

SMILES

AMSR2

RF
Active
total 7

ADEOS-II(2002) EOS-PM1(2002) ALOS(2006)

HTV/JEM(2009) GCOM-W(2011) ALOS-2(2013)

SAR JAXA/METI

PALSAR JAXA/METI

SAR JAXA

SAR JAXA

3. SAR Application for Agriculture

SAR Application Area

Followings are SAR application area for agriculture and required characteristics to extract information used for agriculture.
Agricultural Applications Cropping area of rice field Growth of rice crop Clustering of crops Clustering of usage of farmland Farming area Growth of forest trees and biomass Quick and wide scan Orbit repeatability
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Required SAR characteristics Wider swath Higher spatial resolution Higher S/N Full polarimetry Longer wave length Higher time resolution

3. SAR Application for Agriculture

SAR Application Area

Investigation of cropping area of rice field Cropping area of rice field can be extracted by monitoring the change of surface reflectivity Requirements for SAR sensor - High resolution < 5m During rice planting season, - Wide are coverage > 50km there is water in the rice field - Quick and wide scan

Low reflectivity planting water

High reflectivity vegetative water

During harvest season, there is no water in the rice field

(Ishizuka, ALOS-2/3 workshop, 2010, http://www.eorc.jaxa.jp/ALOS/conf/workshop/jprog_2_3ws_2010mar.htm)

3. SAR Application for Agriculture

SAR Application Area

Investigation of growth of rice crop Growth process of rice crop can be extracted by analyzing Multiple Scattering Mechanisms(Single Bounce, Double Bounce). Requirements for SAR sensor - High resolution < 5m - Wide are coverage > 50km - Quick and GrowthProcessforRiceCrop wide scan
(1)Beforeplanting
no bounce
Surface No randomness

single bounce

double bounce

(3)Harvestseason
Volume High randomness

(2)Growingphase
Double bounce Lowrandomness

3. SAR Application for Agriculture

SAR Application Area

Clustering of crops Clustering of crops can be possible by evaluating difference of Polarimetric data. Requirements for SAR sensor - Full polarimetry HH, HV, VV, VH - polarization isolation > 30dB - High S/N(Signal to Noise ratio) < -25dB* (*Noise equivalent sigma-naught) - Quick and wide scan

Cone Grass

Vertical

Horizontal

Potato

Refection

Transparent

HH HV VV VH

Others Beet Radish

(Ishizuka, ALOS-2/3 workshop, 2010, http://www.eorc.jaxa.jp/ALOS/conf/workshop/jprog_2_3ws_2010mar.htm)

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3. SAR Application for Agriculture

SAR Application Area

Clustering of usage of farmland Clustering of usage of farmland is possible by evaluating combination of Backscattering and Full Polarimetric data. Requirements for SAR sensor - L-band - Wide area coverage > 50km - Quick and wide scan
Forest

Agriculture
Agriculture

Forest

Clearcut
Clearcut

L-band is highly permeable and reflects from trunk and ground

Arii, ALOS-2/3 workshop, 2010, http://www.eorc.jaxa.jp/ALOS/conf/workshop/alos2_ws2/2-5-7_arii.pdf

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3. SAR Application for Agriculture

SAR Application Area

Investigation of farming area 3 dimensional mapping data for base map of farming area can be generated by using Interferometry Data. Requirements for SAR sensor - High S/N(Signal to Noise ratio) < -25dB* - Orbit repeatability < 500m
(*Noise equivalent sigma-naught)

terraced farm area

Okada et.al. Proceedings of IGARSS2009,

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3. SAR Application for Agriculture

SAR Application Area

Investigation of growth of forest trees, biomass Height of trees and biomass can be extracted by analyzing Polarimetoric Interferometry SAR data. Requirements for SAR sensor - L-band - Polarization isolation> 30dB interferometry using - Quick and wide scan
polarimetiric data such as HH, VV.

TANDEM-L: A MISSION PROPOSAL FOR MONITORING DYNAMIC EARTH PROCESSES Proceedings of IGARSS2011, Moreira et. al. 2011,

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3. SAR Application for Agriculture

Other Application Field by ALOS PALSAR (L-band) Flood Detection
Flood area (blue)

Before

After

Detected flooded area

Flood Monitoring in Myanmar (Typhoon in 2008)

http://www.eorc.jaxa.jp/imgdata/practical/natural/flood.html

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3. SAR Application for Agriculture

Other Application Field by ALOS PALSAR (L-band) Surface Movement by Earthquake Forest Monitoring

Oil Spill Monitoring

Surface Movement after the great east Japan earthquake 2011

Oil spill by the accident of tanker in Korea 2011

http://www.eorc.jaxa.jp/imgdata/practical/natural.html http://www.iges.or.jp/en/fc/pdf/20080324reed/10.Isoguchi.pdf

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4. SAR Sensor Hardware

Overview of ALOS-2 SAR Sensor

ALOS-2(Advanced Land Observing Satellite-2) is a successor of earth observation satellite Daichi (ALOS). ALOS-2 has L-band synthetic aperture radar (SAR) system, based on Active Phased Array Antenna (APAA) technology.
Data Relay Satellite Communication Antenna

JAXA

L-band SAR Antenna

Direct Transmission Antenna

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Development of Active Phased Array Antenna for ALOS-2, 2011 Thailand-Japan MicroWave(TJMW2011), 2011, Takehito IGUCHI, Yuji OSAWA and et al.

4. SAR Sensor Hardware

ALOS-2 SAR Sensor Characteristics

ALOS-2 has improved performance compared with PALSAR of ALOS.

Item Resolution Specification Basic Observation Mode 3m Wide Area Observation Mode 100m High Resolution Mode 1-3m Basic Observation Mode 50km Wide Area Observation Mode 350km High Resolution Mode 25km L-band(1.2GHz) 240M-1Gbps(after compression) average observation duty: >30% right-and-left looking Single / Dual / Quad(Full) polarimetry

Swath

Frequency Data Amount observation duty Pointing Polarization

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4. SAR Sensor Hardware

Overview of ALOS-2 SAR Sensor

ALOS-2 has following capability that is enough for agricultural monitoring.

Requirements Wider swath > 50km ALOS-2 Performance > 50km Basic Obs. Mode > 350/490km Wide Area Obs. Mode > 25km High Res. Mode < 3m Basic Obs. Mode < 100m Wide Area Obs. Mode < 1-3m High Res. Mode HH,VV, HV, VH L-band >30dB < -25dB Phased Array < 500m
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Higher spatial resolution

< 5m

Full polarimetry Longer wave length Higher polarization isolation Higher S/N ratio Quick Scan Orbit Repeatability

HH,VV, HV, VH L-band >30dB < -25dB Phased Array < 500m

4. SAR Sensor Hardware

Configuration of ALOS-2 SAR System

ALOS-2 capability is achieved by following SAR system. ELU controls all SAR signal generations and beam management.

SAR Antenna (SAR-ANT) Electric Unit (ELU) IF-UNIT

Folded configuration
EX RX TX SC RX TX DP SC EX

Deployed configuration
Development of Active Phased Array Antenna for ALOS-2, 2011 Thailand-Japan MicroWave(TJMW2011), 2011, Takehito IGUCHI, Yuji OSAWA and et al.

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4. SAR Sensor Hardware

ALOS-2 SAR Antenna Performance

ALOS-2 SAR Antenna has following performance.

Item Antenna type Aperture size Beam steering angle Polarization TX RX Performance Active Phased Array Antenna 2.9m(EL) x 9.9m(AZ) AZ3.5deg EL30deg H,V,45deg,Circular H,V,HV dual

Folded configuration

EL: 30deg

Deployed configuration

AZ : 3.5deg

Development of Active Phased Array Antenna for ALOS-2, 2011 Thailand-Japan MicroWave(TJMW2011), 2011, Takehito IGUCHI, Yuji OSAWA and et al.

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4. SAR Sensor Hardware

ALOS-2 SAR Antenna Configuration

ALOS-2 SAR antenna is consists from Radiating Elements and RF Modules. As Radiating Elements, sub-array antenna is adopted. For RF Modules, GaN device is partly used for the high power amplifier.

AELT

Sub-array antenna : AELT

Radiating Elements

Development of Active Phased Array Antenna for ALOS-2, 2011 Thailand-Japan MicroWave(TJMW2011), 2011, Takehito IGUCHI, Yuji OSAWA and et al.

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5. Conclusions
MELCO has been involved in the government observation satellite programs for over 30 years as system prime contractor and has many heritage of LEO observation platform and components. MELCO is now developing ALOS-2 to be launched in 2013. ALOS-2 has state-of-the-art L-band SAR sensor that has high resolution, polarimetry(HH/VV/HV/VH) and PAA capability. ALOS-2 can contribute to various applications for agricultural monitoring. MELCO would like to contribute to SAR applications for various fields and is ready to make detailed discussions for future cooperation and contributions.

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