The coregistration, calibration, and interpretation of multiseason JERS-1 SAR data over South America

The Large-Scale Biosphere–Atmosphere (LBA) experiment in Amazônia represents a unique opportunity to make a comprehensive study of the Amazon region and its component ecosystems. To make sense of the field studies and to generalize the results from them, remote sensing techniques and comprehensive mapping are critical elements for producing region-wide science results. In this paper, we present the processing work done for one such mapping campaign, that of the JERS-1 L-band two season (low and high-flood) SAR data collected in 1995 and 1996. Specifically, to make a useable resource for other LBA researchers to explore, the datasets from the two seasons had to be coregistered (to a sub-pixel level), radiometrically calibrated, and interpreted to verify the quality of the data. This paper describes the techniques used to achieve these goals and an estimate of the land cover based on a simple classification of the data.