Evaluation of trihedral corner reflector for SAR polarimetric calibration

A trihedral corner reflector is often used for SAR polari- metric calibration. However, the scattering property of the reflector used for the calibration may not be correct if the high frequency approximation is not satisfied or if an incident angle deviates from the symmetric axis of the reflector. In order to know the conditions for precise SAR polarimetric calibration, we evaluated the polarimetric response of the reflector by a numerical simulation using the method of moment (MoM). It is found that allowable incident angle deviation is 5 degree to azimuth direction and 4 degree to elevation direction for precise SAR polarimetric calibration when the size of the reflector is 7.5 times larger than the wavelength of an incident wave.