Terrain characterisation of Heard, McDonald and Macquarie Islands using multi-frequency Interferometric Synthetic Aperture Radar (InSAR) data

This study investigates the use of multi-frequency (X- and L-band) Interferometric Synthetic Aperture Radar (InSAR) data for Digital Elevation Model (DEM) generation, coastline detection and land cover mapping over Heard, McDonald and Macquarie Islands in Australian Antarctic Territory. Conventional interferometric processing was applied to generate DEMs using recently acquired SAR data. The variable capacity to extract height information from X- and L-band SAR data was investigated. Elevation data was also compared with previously available DEMs generated using NASA JPL TOPSAR and RADARSAT-1 data. Land cover and surface dynamics and the capacity for coastline detection were also investigated using the multi-temporal, multi-frequency SAR intensity data. InSAR is invaluable as a source of elevation data and for extraction of land cover features and surface dynamics, especially in remote and cloud-affected regions such as the Antarctic.