Experimental Demonstration of Bistatic UAV-Borne SAR and InSAR

The Distributed Aperture Radar Tomographic Sensors (DARTS) project at NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory aims to mature and demonstrate multi-static SAR measurements for fine-scale 3D imaging of surface topography, vegetation, and surface deformation and change. The project explores the use of drones as SAR platforms and integrates software-defined radar on RF system-on-chip for compact and flexible radar instruments. This paper highlights the progress in DARTS hardware development, experiments, and data processing. The recent experiments have successfully demon-strated monostatic interferometry as well as acquisition and processing of bi-static SAR imagery. By leveraging the ad-vantages of multi-static SAR and drone-based platforms, the project aims to build a testbed for future mission design and enhanced SAR imaging capabilities for scientific applications.