5. Remote Sensing of Land Surfaces 4: Signal-to-Background High Contrast Ratio Filtering of Polarimetric Reflections

This chapter focuses on water and soil, two of the four primary observational subjects of the Earth’s surface (rocks, water, soil, and vegetation) to introduce the fourth important characteristic of polarization reflection of land surface: the high signal-to-background ratio filtering feature. This includes: polarization reflection radio filtering of water bodies in dark backgrounds (weak light intensification) to explain the nature of data filtering in polarimetric remote sensing when it intensifies weak light; strong water bodies’ sun-glint polarization separation (bright light attenuation) and the measurement of the density of water to explain the nature of data filtering in polarimetric remote sensing when it attenuates bright light; soil polarimetric reflection filtering characteristics, to show the polarimetric remote sensing high signal-to-background ratio filtering feature; the high signal-to-background ratio filtering relationship between soil water content and polarization to show polarization remote sensing’s ability in high signal-to-background ratio filtering.