Title :
backscatter and interferometry for estimating above- ground biomass intropical savanna woodland
Author :
Viergever, Karin M. ; Woodhouse, Iain H. ; Stuart, Neil
Author_Institution :
Univ. of Edinburgh, Edinburgh
Abstract :
Tropical savannas cover 15% of the Earth´s land surface and are important ecosystems in the global Carbon cycle due to their high productivity. SAR interferometry and backscatter are investigated for estimating biomass in a tropical savanna in Belize, Central America. Single-pass InSAR data used are C-band (AIRSAR) and X-band (Intermap); SAR backscatter data used are fully polarimetric L and P band (AIRSAR). Results show that both C-band and X-band InSAR show a clear trend in vegetation patterns although both underestimate vegetation heights due to the heterogeneity of the vegetation cover. The scattering phase centre is lowered more for the X-band due to larger ground- level contribution. High P and L-band backscatter values are observed for areas containing high biomass vegetation, but also for leafy palmetto that have relatively low biomass.
Keywords :
backscatter; radar interferometry; synthetic aperture radar; vegetation; AIRSAR data; Belize; Central America; Intermap data; SAR interferometry; above ground biomass estimation; backscatter; global carbon cycle; tropical savanna woodland; vegetation patterns; Backscatter; Biomass; Earth; Ecosystems; L-band; Land surface; Productivity; Scattering; Synthetic aperture radar interferometry; Vegetation; AIRSAR; Intermap Technologies; biomass estimation; digital surface model (DSM); heterogeneous; tree height; tropical savanna; woodland;
Conference_Titel :
Geoscience and Remote Sensing Symposium, 2007. IGARSS 2007. IEEE International
Conference_Location :
Barcelona
Print_ISBN :
978-1-4244-1211-2
Electronic_ISBN :
978-1-4244-1212-9
DOI :
10.1109/IGARSS.2007.4423312
