Microwaves and Radar Institute

Home|Sitemap|Contact|Accessibility Imprint and terms of use Privacy |Deutsch

Microwaves and Radar Institute

Prof. Dr.-Ing. Alberto Moreira
Director of the Institute, Wessling

Microwaves and Radar Institute

With its know-how and expertise in passive and active microwave remote sensing, the Microwaves and Radar Institute contributes to the development and advancement of ground-based, airborne and spaceborne sensors. The focus of its research work is on the conception and development of new synthetic aperture radar (SAR) techniques and systems, as well as sensor-specific applications.

Full article

News

RADIAN interprets satellite images soon with KI

26 July 2021
(IN GERMAN) The analysis of radar images is a demanding task: Image effects such as geometric distortions or image noise make interpretation difficult. To make this as intuitive as possible, scientists at the German Aerospace Center (DLR) have established the image analysis tool RADIAN (RAdar IMage ANalysis). RADIAN has been in use for more than ten years and is constantly being further developed. Now the focus is on automated information retrieval. To this end, an artificial intelligence (AI) is to learn to recognize changes in objects on the basis of existing data records. Such objects include aircraft, ships, vehicles, containers and buildings.

DLR Weekly: An interferometric radar for Venus – DLR participates in NASA's VERITAS mission

14 June 2021
The DLR centers Oberpfaffenhofen near Munich and Berlin are excited to be a part of the VERITAS team to explore the surface and interior of Venus. Our engineering and science teams are in close collaboration with NASA JPL for the past decade to refine the VERITAS design developing the VEM (Venus Emissivity Mapper) prototype and VISAR (Veritas Interferometric Synthetic Aperture Radar) instrument and software design together. The radar end-to-end simulator, instrument performance models and processing algorithms for the innovative VISAR are being developed by the DLR Microwaves and Radar Institute (HR) and the DLR Remote Sensing Technology Institute (IMF).

Press Release: "Research Project GeoWAM: New geodata for water management by airborne radar missions

04 May 2021
The GeoWAM research project, funded by the German Federal Ministry of Transport and Digital Infrastructure (BMVI), is developing new approaches to the acquisition of geodata for the water management of coastal areas that are influenced by tides. The first geodata from several radar flights within GeoWAM have now been processed. They will be presented during an online workshop on June 17, 2021.
More: GeoWAM, Workshop, Press Release, Web News

DLR develops unmanned stratocruiser

21 April 2021
IN GERMAN: Erdbeobachtung und globale Kommunikation – zwei Begriffe, die einen sofort an Satelliten denken lassen. Bau und Positionierung sind teuer und am Ende kann Weltraumschrott zurückbleiben. Aber auch Flugzeuge oder Hubschrauber sind für diese Aufgabe nicht ideal. Ihr Einsatz ist zeitlich und örtlich begrenzt und stark wetterabhängig. Ein Team des Deutschen Zentrums für Luft- und Raumfahrt (DLR) erforscht und entwickelt ein unbemanntes und solarbetriebenes Stratosphärenflugzeug für zukünftige wissenschaftliche Experimente, das die Vorzüge von Raumfahrt und Luftfahrt vereint.

Using principles from painting – creating 3D-effect satellite images in true colour

29 March 2021
How can an impression of three-dimensionality be created using a two-dimensional medium? In art, this question arose centuries ago. Certain painting techniques have since evolved to simulate effects of light and shadow, creating a 3D effect for the viewer. Such effects are referred to as trompe-l'œil – they 'deceive the eye'.

Harmony: A mission for Earth's future

01 March 2021
'Harmony', its focus is Earth observation, space, global change, is intended to answer important scientific questions about changes to oceans, ice and land. ESA has selected 'Harmony' as a future mission in the field of Earth observation. Understanding the changes happening to Earth and its delicate balance is of ever increasing importance. "With the Harmony mission, we have the opportunity to gain new insights into processes that take place within the Earth system. This represents a considerable scientific and technical challenge," says Alberto Moreira, Director of the German Aerospace Center (Deutsches Zentrum für Luft- und Raumfahrt; DLR) Microwaves and Radar Institute.

Global Change: The Earth System

18. January 2021
‘Global change’ is not a recently invented term – it has been used since the 1980s to describe changes in the Earth system driven or triggered by human activities. In contrast to climate change, which only deals with one specific issue, global change takes into account a larger range of processes. For many years, DLR has been researching global change with a wide variety of missions. It develops archiving and processing technologies, devises algorithms for extracting relevant parameters from EO data and analyses the results.

Season´s Greetings and wishes from TanDEM-X!

22. Dezember 2020
Our Christmas star (Download [11 MB]) this year comes from Italy and was observed by the TanDEM-X satellite mission. The municipality of Palmanova, a UNESCO World Heritage Site, is located in the Veneto region. It was laid out at the end of the 16th century as a fortified city of the Republic of Venice, and its star-shaped layout followed the concept of Renaissance city planners for an ideal city. In this TanDEM-X image, the surface elevation is shown in colors (dark blue is 12 m and red is 38 m above mean sea level), while the brightness is proportional to the radar backscatter intensity. TanDEM-X was launched in 2010 and has been operating since then together with its twin TerraSAR-X as a bistatic SAR interferometer. This year we are commenmorating 10 years of TanDEM-X operations in close formation flight. The global digital elevation model (DEM) of TanDEM-X has been available since 2016 for commercial and scientific applications. A new edition of this global dataset, denoted as Change DEM, will be available soon.

Look out for further news on TanDEM-X on www.dlr.de/HR.

The Microwaves and Radar Institute wishes you Merry Christmas 2020 and a Happy New Year 2021!

On to new heights - 10 years of TanDEM-X

20 December 2020
IN GERMAN: Seit Dezember 2010 bilden die Zwillingssatelliten TerraSAR-X und TanDEM-X, die im engen Formationsflug um die Erde kreisen, ein einzigartiges Radarinterferometer. Was bis 2010 nur in 2D erfassbar war (Bildteil in Schwarz-Weiß), gewann mit dem Satelliten TanDEM-X eine Dimension dazu. Zu sehen ist das Lenadelta in Russland. Der Fluss mündet hier nach 4.294 Kilometern in die Laptewsee, ein Randmeer des Arktischen Ozeans. Die etwa 1.500 kleinen Inseln im Delta ändern permanent ihre Form, weil das mitgeführte Material sich als Sediment ablagert und das Wasser umlenkt. In einem Atlas wäre das gesamte Gebiet nur in einer Höhe dargestellt. TanDEM-X sieht die Unterschiede viel differenzierter – mit einer Genauigkeit, die zwei Meter Auflösung noch übertrifft. Bereits 2016 erstellten DLR-Wissenschaftlerinnen und -Wissenschaftler ein exaktes 3D-Höhenmodell der gesamten Erdoberfläche aus den Daten der Mission TanDEM-X. Seitdem sammeln die Zwillingssatelliten Daten für ein zweites globales Höhenmodell. Das soge-nannte Change DEM (Digital Elevation Model) dokumentiert Veränderungen der Erdoberfläche in drei Dimensionen. Erste Auswertungen zeigen dramatische Entwicklungen wie das Abschmelzen von Gletschern und Eisschilden oder die ungehemmte Abholzung tropischer Wälder.

Glacial retreat in the Alps – first comprehensive documentation

08 July 2020
A research team from Friedrich-Alexander-Universität Erlangen-Nürnberg (FAU) conducted the first study of area and elevation changes for all Alpine glaciers over a period of 14 years. This involved comparing three-dimensional terrain models obtained from the German radar satellite mission TanDEM-X and the German-US Shuttle Radar Topography Mission (SRTM) between 2000 and 2014. The team combined the elevation models with optical images from NASA’s Landsat satellites. They found that the Alps have lost approximately 17 percent of their total ice volume since the turn of the millennium. The team recently published the results of their study in the journal Nature Communications.

Congratulations, TanDEM-X – 10 years of 3D mapping from space

25 June 2020
A new era in radar remote sensing began 10 years ago, on 21 June 2010, when the radar satellite TanDEM-X was launched. Since then, it has been orbiting Earth in close formation flight with TerraSAR-X, its three-year-older 'twin'. The distance between the satellites varies between several kilometres and sometimes only 120 metres. This enables the radar sensors to obtain a 3D view of Earth. This is referred to as a bistatic interferometer in space, which allows the terrain structure to be recorded in three dimensions in just one pass. This space mission continues to be globally unique.

News Archive

Departments of the Institute


TanDEM-X Latest News


TanDEM-X DEM Gallery

TanDEM-X Images [6 MB]

TanDEM-X Forest Map


TerraSAR-X Info

TerraSAR-X Picture Gallery


Tandem-L Latest News


Compact Test Range

Airborne SAR (F-SAR)

Mechanical Lab


E-SAR and F-SAR Picture Gallery


EUSAR 2022


HR Institute Seminar

Scientific Colloquium DLR Oberpfaffenhofen

Brochures of the Institute

Status Report 2011 – 2018 (52.3 MB)

Status Report 2006 – 2011 (31.83 MB)

Status Report 2000 - 2005 (11.12 MB)

Research and Projects (10 MB)

HR-Brochure (1.94 MB)

TerraSAR-X Brochure (9.06 MB)

TanDEM-X Brochure (8.05 MB)

Tandem-L Brochure (3.28 MB)

Helmholtz Alliance "Remote Sensing and Earth System Dynamics" (5.85 MB)

TanDEM-X - Die Erde in 3D (1.63 MB)


HR Institute on YouTube

Institute's History: A Retrospective 1908 - 2008 (PDF 34.39 MB)

Microwaves and Radar Institute

RADIAN interprets satellite images soon with KI

DLR Weekly: An interferometric radar for Venus – DLR participates in NASA's VERITAS mission

Press Release: "Research Project GeoWAM: New geodata for water management by airborne radar missions

DLR develops unmanned stratocruiser

Using principles from painting – creating 3D-effect satellite images in true colour

Harmony: A mission for Earth's future

Global Change: The Earth System

Season´s Greetings and wishes from TanDEM-X!

On to new heights - 10 years of TanDEM-X

Glacial retreat in the Alps – first comprehensive documentation

Congratulations, TanDEM-X – 10 years of 3D mapping from space

SAR Technology

Radar Concepts

Satellite SAR Systems

Reconnaissance and Security