RADAR REFLECTION FROM A PLANETARY SURFACE DESCRIBED BY A COMPOSITE CORRELATION FUNCTION
Abstract
An earlier theoretical study of radar reflection from a rough planetary surface is extended to include the case where the surface correlation function consists of two or more components. When both large- and small-scale structures are simultaneously present, it is found that the latter may completely dominate the autocorrelation function of the echo and thus render the former undetectable by c-w methods. An additional finding is that the large-scale structure may be detectable in the angular power spectrum obtained from very short pulses as a separate pip at the origin. Experimental confirmation for the lunar case is described. The effective radar gain of the surface derived by the methods of physical optics is found to have a maximum value of unity which leads to a minimum value of 3 for the dielectric constant of the surface. The spectrum of the surface fluctuations inferred from the wavelength-dependence of the surface slope is found to have a gap for components having a scale of the order of a few meters.
Document Details
- Document Type
- Technical Report
- Publication Date
- May 01, 1963
- Accession Number
- AD0408198
Entities
People
- Fred B. Daniels
Organizations
- United States Army Communications-Electronics Command