Point spread function analysis for GNSS-based multistatic SAR

This letter presents an analysis of the multistatic point-spread function (MPSF) for passive synthetic aperture radar (SAR) with navigation satellites as opportunity transmitters and a stationary receiver. It is shown that a noncoherent combination of bistatic SAR images, obtained by multiple, spatially separated satellites, can yield multistatic imagery that may be essentially improved in terms of resolution when compared with a single bistatic SAR image. The MPSF is derived analytically, for an arbitrary number of bistatic acquisitions and for any bistatic topologies. Analytical results are confirmed using both simulated and experimental data. The obtained result could be applied for the analysis of spatial resolution in multistatic real time radar, thus enabling the adaptive selection of the more suitable opportunity transmitters.