Using Regional GPS Network Atmospheric Models for Mitigating Errors in Interferometric Synthetic Aperture Radar (InSAR) Images

Abstract:

Interferometric Synthetic Aperture Radar (InSAR) measurements provide valuable information for obtaining Earth surface deformation and topography at high spatial resolution for crustal deformation studies. Similar to Global Positioning System (GPS), InSAR phase measurements are affected by the Earth’s ionospheric and tropospheric layers as the electromagnetic signals significantly refract while propagating through the different layers. While electromagnetic signals propagating through the neutral atmosphere are affected primarily by the pressure, temperature, and water vapor content of atmospheric gases, the propagation through the ionosphere is mainly affected by the number of free electrons along the signal path. Here, we present the use of dense regional GPS networks for extracting tropospheric zenith delays and ionospheric Total Electron Content (TEC) maps in order to reduce the noise levels in the phase measurement of the InSAR images. The results show significant reduction in the RMS values when simultaneously combining the two corrections, both at short time periods where no surface deformation is expected, and at longer periods, where imaging of crustal deformation, such as the ground subsidence and aseismic fault creep, is enhanced.