On the improvement of sea ice classification by means of radar polarimetry

摘要

Since the early 90s, a number of studies have been published that focus on the utilization of po-larimetric synthetic aperture radar (SAR) imagery for sea ice monitoring. The most recent work in this field, carried out by different groups, has been one part of an ESA-initiated study on the use of polarimetry and po-larimetric interferometry for applications development in land and ocean monitoring. One of the objectives of the sea ice work has been a critical assessment of the benefits gained by polarimetric SAR in ice type discrimination. To this end, the results of earlier studies have been reviewed, and new data sets as well as new algorithms have been considered. In this paper, an overview of the state-of-the-art is provided.