Participants in this course will develop the following skills:

• Intuitive understanding of SAR image and phase information
• Understanding the role of wavelength and signal polarization on SAR image content
• Use of interferometric SAR techniques to measure cm-scale surface deformation.
• Use polarimetric information to analyze ecosystem parameters
• Select the right sensor wavelength and polarization for your application.

Week 1: Course Introduction and Basic Capabilities of SAR

Week 1 will introduce you to the main content and structure of this course. You will also learn about the lab environment that will be available for learners on the “verified track”. The following items will be addressed:

• Introduction to the concept and upcoming lectures and exercises related to this course
• Presentation of the course syllabus
• Presentation of SAR data examples to familiarize students with the appearance and properties of SAR data

Week 2: Introduction to Synthetic Aperture Radar Remote Sensing

Week 2 will introduce the main concepts of Synthetic Aperture Radar (SAR imaging along with the properties and information content of SAR data). You will also learn about the lab environment that will be available for learners on the verified track. Specific topics will include:

• Properties of microwaves
• What is Synthetic Aperture Radar (SAR) imaging
• Geometric and radiometric properties of SAR
• How SAR sees the world
• Verified Track: Lab exercise on exploring SAR time series for flooding events

Week 3: Introduction to Interferometric SAR (InSAR)

Week 3 will introduce the concepts and applications of Interferometric SAR (InSAR) processing. InSAR uses the phase signal captured in SAR data to track subtle surface movements such as those related to seismic events and volcanic activity. Specifically, Week 3 will address the following items:

• Concepts of Interferometric SAR processing and its main applications
• InSAR for topographic mapping
• InSAR for deformation monitoring
• A glimpse into InSAR time series analysis techniques
• Further reading
• Verified Track: Lab exercise analyzing and interpreting InSAR products

Week 4: The Concepts and Applications of Polarimetric SAR (PolSAR)

InSAR time series analysis techniques enable the tracking of cm-scale surface displacements over long times. These techniques are relevant for a number of hazard applications such as landslide and volcano monitoring. In Week 4 we will address:

• What is polarization and how do different polarizations "see"
• Use polarization to generate color representations of SAR data
• Polarimetric decompositions: Combining information at different polarizations to better understand the earth environment
• Verified Track: Lab exercise generating forest degradation indices from dual-pol SAR data