Optimal Sar Processing Beamwidth for High Altitude Airborne Radar Depth Sounder Data

Future sea-level rise will have significant impacts on populations living in costal regions, and the development of coastal infrastructure. Adaptation to these changes to minimize the negative consequences requires improved sea-level rise predictions. While there are several contributors to changes in sea level, future changes in the Antarctic and Greenland ice sheets are perhaps the least understood. Accurately mapping the bed topography will contribute greatly to improving predictive ice-sheet models. This makes the accurate sounding of polar ice of paramount importance to predicting sea level rise. One tool for mapping bedrock is the use of Synthetic Aperture Radar (SAR) processing. One variable aspect of SAR processing is choosing an effective beamwidth over which to process. This is of special concern when data is acquired from a high-altitude airborne platform where the radar has a very large footprint on the ground.