Quality analysis for images acquired by a new microwave staring correlation imaging technique

Microwave staring correlation (MSC) imaging is a new type of active high-resolution microwave imaging technique. Image quality assessment is of vital for developing and monitoring any remote imaging system. This paper presented the image quality analysis for this imaging technique by theoretical analysis and simulation. MSC imaging method was introduced firstly. Then, image properties were analyzed and compared with SAR image. Speckle noise effect and side lobe of point target effect, which are intrinsic properties of SAR image, do not exist in MSC image. The quality metrics of MSC image were presented. IRW-Staring time ratio was proposed to describe the image property that image resolution improves with the number of received signals used in the image reconstruction procedure. Finally, the effects of different system parameters on the image quality were investigated via simulation experiments. The analysis results could be helpful for future imaging algorithm development and system design.