SAR Image Statistics by Bandwidth Using a Mixture Distribution of Persistent Scatterer and Clutter Distributions

In InSAR time series analysis, persistent scatterers (PS) are pixels that remain temporally correlated even in areas of otherwise high decorrelation. Using these stable pixels as reference points, we can analyze deformation signals on the Earth’s surface down to the millimeter scale. PS possess different physical and statistical properties compared to the background, and analyzing the statistical behavior of PS can help to elucidate radar backscattering behavior from different terrain. Here, we propose a new statistical characterization of SAR image power using a mixture distribution of PS and non-PS points, i.e. clutter. We find that a lognormal distribution fits both pixel types, validated by a scattering model that is a function of bandwidth. We present here from C-band RADARSAT-2 data, and will compare these with additional C-band Sentinel data and L-band data from ALOS-2.