Comparison of the TanDEM-X response between vertical and horizontal oriented vegetation

Abstract

The results of a two-year precision agriculture project have clearly demonstrated that TanDEM-X can successfully classify crops morphology through cultivation period. It has been found that TanDEM-X mission is capable of tracking the crop height, and the accuracy of the height estimation depends on the crop morphology, which causes a diversity between canopy top and acquisition phase center. In this work, in addition to interferometry with single polarized channels, polarimetric-interferometric acquisitions have been employed to figure out phase center diversity. The analysis showed that there is a diversity between height estimations from HH and VV polarized interferometric channels, which can reach to 10 cm in the reproductive stages of the crops.