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Conference Agenda

Overview and details of the sessions of this conference. Please select a date or location to show only sessions at that day or location. Please select a single session for detailed view (with abstracts and downloads if available).

Daily Overview

Session

SAR Missions and PolInSAR Initiatives
Location: Red Hall
Session Chair: Irena Hajnsek, DLR/ETH Zürich
Session Chair: Francesco Sarti, European Space Agency (ESA)

Presentation 5

12:30pm - 12:50pm

Introducing the LSI-VC PolSAR Activity – A CEOS Effort to Support the Advancement of Polarimetric SAR R&D for Experts and New Users

Ake Rosenqvist^1,4, Magdalena Fitrzyk^2,3, Francesco Sarti³, Takeo Tadono⁴

1: solo Earth Observation (soloEO), Japan; 2: RSAC c/o ESA, Italy; 3: European Space Agency, Italy; 4: Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency, Japan

Although Polarimetric SAR (PolSAR), Polarimetric Interferometric SAR (Pol-InSAR), and multi-frequency SAR systems hold significant scientific and operational potential, their research and application remain relatively underdeveloped. This limitation is to a large extent attributable to the scarcity of consistent, long-term time series of polarimetric data for research and development, as well as the limited availability of (near-)coincident, multi-sensor, multi-frequency datasets required for interoperability studies.

The potential coordinating role of the Committee on Earth Observation Satellites (CEOS)—serving as a conduit between the SAR research community and space agencies operating SAR missions—was highlighted during the ESA PolInSAR Workshop held in Toulouse, France, in June 2023. Following subsequent discussions between the ESA PolInSAR representatives and the CEOS Land Surface Imaging Virtual Constellation (LSI-VC), a dedicated LSI-VC PolSAR activity was initiated in 2024.

The LSI-VC PolSAR activity aims to facilitate coordination among relevant space agencies operating SAR missions with polarimetric capabilities, promoting the systematic acquisition of polarimetric and multi-frequency SAR observations over a defined set of CEOS PolSAR reference sites. Data tasking and acquisitions are conducted on a best-effort basis.

A PolSAR Science Team has been formed, and approximately 25 global reference sites have been identified to represent diverse ecosystems and land cover types. Ten CEOS member agencies have been engaged, with the potential to contribute polarimetric SAR data across all operational radar frequency bands available from space—P, L, S, C, and X. Data acquisitions began in late 2025 and are scheduled to continue through 2026.

Collaboration with the CEOS System Engineering Office (SEO) additionally provides the PolSAR Science Team access to a cloud-based environment for SAR and PolSAR data analysis via the CEOS Analytics Lab (CAL). The CAL platform has been extended to include a suite of SAR analytical tools and software packages, including SNAP and PolSARpro.

In the longer term, and subject to the data policies of the individual SAR missions, the compiled datasets are foreseen to be made available to a wider scientific community engaged in polarimetric and tomographic SAR research. This initiative aims to advance the development of polarimetric and multi-frequency SAR science and applications and to lower the entry bar for new user groups.