GNSS Reflectometer Instrument for Bi-static Synthetic Aperture Radar (GRIBSAR) Measurements of Earth Science Parameters

Global Navigation Satellite System (GNSS) signals scattered from ocean, land and ice are affected by the reflecting surface, and hence the changes induced by the surface can be observed. The full-time operation of radio navigation satellites system, abundant global signal coverage and spread spectrum communication for flexible signal processing makes GNSS reflected signals a viable candidate for Signal-Of-Opportunity (SOO) passive sensing. Existing research has shown that GNSS-Reflectometry (GNSS-R) based remote sensing has the potential to give environmental scientists a low-cost, wide-coverage measurement network that will greatly increase our knowledge of the Earth's environmental processes. The Intelligent Automation, Inc. (IAI) team proposes to develop a GNSS Reflectometer Instrument for Bi-static Synthetic Aperture Radar (GRIBSAR) for measuring earth science parameters. Our proposed approach is modular, scalable and meets the NASA goals of multi-channel, GNSS-R system to exploit GNSS reflected signals as SOO.

GRIBSAR can be used for a wide range of remote sensing applications for NASA including: - Reconfigurable radar systems for UAVs and manned aircrafts - Tomographic Radar for Biomass and Ice-sheet imaging. - Algorithm development platform for existing NASA radar platforms.

The most promising commercial applications of GRIBSAR, besides NASA applications are: - Real-time digital processors: The MCDP platform represents a generic digital processing platform that can be integrated in a number of radar and communications applications. - Multi-channel GPS/GNSS Signal recorder and processing - Passive direction-finding

This is early/mid-stage (TRL 4) — the most realistic path in is NASA SBIR/STTR, which funds small businesses and research institutions to develop technology aligned with NASA's needs (equity-free, phased funding). Check whether a current SBIR/STTR solicitation topic overlaps with this project's technology area, or contact the project directly (above) to ask.

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