Acceleration-independent along-track velocity estimation of moving targets

In the study a new method for along-track velocity estimation of moving targets is presented. This method exploits the along-track interferometric phase ramp of a range-compressed moving target signal between two or more receiving channels. The slope of this phase ramp is mainly influenced by the along-track velocity but not by accelerations. Hence, acceleration-independent along-track velocity estimation is feasible. A verification of the proposed method is performed by using both simulations and real two- and four-channel X-band data acquired with DLR's E-SAR and F-SAR system.