SAR polarimetric change detection for flooded vegetation

Due to spatial and temporal variability an effective monitoring system for water resources must consider the use of remote sensing to provide information. Synthetic Aperture Radar (SAR) is useful due to timely data acquisition and sensitivity to surface water and flooded vegetation. The ability to map flooded vegetation is attributed to the double bounce scattering mechanism, often dominant for this target. Dong Ting Lake in China is an ideal site for evaluating SAR data for this application due to annual flooding caused by mountain snow melt causing extensive changes in flooded vegetation. A curvelet-based approach for change detection in SAR imagery works well as it highlights the change and suppresses the speckle noise. This paper addresses the extension of this change detection technique to polarimetric SAR data for monitoring surface water and flooded vegetation. RADARSAT-2 images of Dong Ting Lake demonstrate this curvelet-based change detection technique applied to wetlands although it is applicable to other land covers and for post disaster impact assessment. These tools are important to Digital Earth for map updating and revision.