Dr Raffaella Guida
Lecturer in Satellite Remote Sensing
Qualifications: PhD
Email: r.guida@surrey.ac.uk
Phone: Work: 01483 68 2227
Room no: 22 BA 01
Office hours
9am-5pm
Further information
Biography
Raffaella was born in Naples, Italy, on October 24, 1975. She received the laurea degree (summa cum laude) in Telecommunications Engineering and the Ph.D. degree in Electronic and Telecommunications Engineering, both from the University Federico II of Naples, Italy.
In 2006, she was a Guest Scientist at the Department of Photogrammetry and Remote Sensing, Technische Universitaet Muenchen, Germany, where she spent 6 months on completion of her PhD thesis on urban remote sensing with Synthetic Aperture Radar (SAR).
In October 2008 Raffaella joined the Surrey Space Center (SSC) as Lecturer in Satellite Remote Sensing. In SSC she heads the Remote Sensing Applications group and supervises several national and international research projects.
She also lectures in the Laboratories, Design and Professional Studies I and II.
For her excellent in teaching and her keen attitude to introduce new teaching methodologies, Raffaella has been awarded the Teaching with New Technologies (TeNT) Award by University of Surrey in 2008.
She is an active member of the Surrey Water Innovation Research & Learning (SWIRL) group at University of Surrey where she is responsible for looking at water, health and sanitation in the developing world from the remote sensing perspective.
Research Interests
Her main research interests are in the field of electromagnetics and microwave remote sensing, particularly in
- Synthetic Aperture Radar (SAR)
- simulation of SAR raw signals
- post-processing of SAR images
- scattering models from natural and not natural targets
- statistical models for SAR images
- feature extraction
- change detection
She is keen on looking at every possible application in remote sensing, from urban areas monitoring to natural disasters, vegetation and water conditions, fire detection, maritime surveillance and many others. With her expertise she supports the design and testing of new remote sensing missions in SSC and Surrey Satellites Technology Ltd (SSTL) working as a connector between mission designers and final users.
Research Collaborations
Raffaella has a huge network of international collaborations with universities, space agencies, space and remote sensing companies and non-governmental organizations. Please, feel free to join her network on Linkedin
Publications
Highlights
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(2010) 'Assessment of TerraSAR-X Products with a New Feature Extraction Application: Monitoring of Cylindrical Tanks'. IEEE-INST ELECTRICAL ELECTRONICS ENGINEERS INC IEEE T GEOSCI REMOTE, 48 (2), pp. 930-938.Full text is available at: http://epubs.surrey.ac.uk/533271/
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(2010) 'Height Retrieval of Isolated Buildings From Single High-Resolution SAR Images'. IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON GEOSCIENCE AND REMOTE SENSING, 48 (7), pp. 2967-2979.Full text is available at: http://epubs.surrey.ac.uk/533270/
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(2008) 'Model-Based Interpretation of High-Resolution SAR Images of Buildings'. IEEE IEEE Journal of Selected Topics in Applied Earth Observations and Remote Sensing, 1 (2), pp. 107-119.Full text is available at: http://epubs.surrey.ac.uk/533272/
Abstract
High-resolution (HR) synthetic aperture radar (SAR) images of urban areas reveal a large variety of details that, although potentially bringing a lot of information, are often very difficult to interpret. Until now, most of the research activity in this field has been devoted to the attempt to retrieve geometric information on buildings in terms of their positions and sizes, by using simplified geometrical models. However, this approach does not allow us to fully exploit the large amount of information present in HR SAR images. In order to improve information retrieval from such images, and, hence, their interpretation, in this paper, we propose to employ a more refined model that accounts for both geometrical (including fine details) and electromagnetic properties of the building. A meaningful case study is presented to show that the main features appearing on the SAR image of a building can be interpreted by using our geometric and electromagnetic model. In addition, a first example of retrieval of the complex dielectric constant of building materials from a SAR image is presented.
- . (2004) 'Efficient Simulation of hybrid stripmap/spotlight SAR raw signals from extended scenes'. IEEE IEEE Transactions on Geoscience and Remote Sensing, 42 (11), pp. 2385-2396.
Journal articles
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(2012) 'On Single-look Multivariate G Distribution for PolSAR Data'. IEEE IEEE Journal of Selected Topics in Applied Earth Observations and Remote Sensing, 5 (4), pp. 1149-1163.Full text is available at: http://epubs.surrey.ac.uk/533332/
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(2010) 'Assessment of TerraSAR-X Products with a New Feature Extraction Application: Monitoring of Cylindrical Tanks'. IEEE-INST ELECTRICAL ELECTRONICS ENGINEERS INC IEEE T GEOSCI REMOTE, 48 (2), pp. 930-938.Full text is available at: http://epubs.surrey.ac.uk/533271/
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(2010) 'Height Retrieval of Isolated Buildings From Single High-Resolution SAR Images'. IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON GEOSCIENCE AND REMOTE SENSING, 48 (7), pp. 2967-2979.Full text is available at: http://epubs.surrey.ac.uk/533270/
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(2008) 'Model-Based Interpretation of High-Resolution SAR Images of Buildings'. IEEE IEEE Journal of Selected Topics in Applied Earth Observations and Remote Sensing, 1 (2), pp. 107-119.Full text is available at: http://epubs.surrey.ac.uk/533272/
Abstract
High-resolution (HR) synthetic aperture radar (SAR) images of urban areas reveal a large variety of details that, although potentially bringing a lot of information, are often very difficult to interpret. Until now, most of the research activity in this field has been devoted to the attempt to retrieve geometric information on buildings in terms of their positions and sizes, by using simplified geometrical models. However, this approach does not allow us to fully exploit the large amount of information present in HR SAR images. In order to improve information retrieval from such images, and, hence, their interpretation, in this paper, we propose to employ a more refined model that accounts for both geometrical (including fine details) and electromagnetic properties of the building. A meaningful case study is presented to show that the main features appearing on the SAR image of a building can be interpreted by using our geometric and electromagnetic model. In addition, a first example of retrieval of the complex dielectric constant of building materials from a SAR image is presented.
- . (2007) 'Building Height Retrieval From Radiometric Parameters On SAR Images'. Rivista Italiana di Telerilevamento - Italian Journal of Remote Sensing, 38, pp. 97-106.
- . (2006) 'A Tool for Planning of High Resolution/Wide Coverage Imaging Radars'. Rivista Italiana di Telerilevamento - Italian Journal of Remote Sensing, 35, pp. 45-52.
- . (2004) 'Efficient Simulation of hybrid stripmap/spotlight SAR raw signals from extended scenes'. IEEE IEEE Transactions on Geoscience and Remote Sensing, 42 (11), pp. 2385-2396.
Conference papers
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(2012) 'THE NEW DUAL-TEXTURE G DISTRIBUTION FOR SINGLE-LOOK POLSAR DATA'. IEEE IGARSS 2012, pp. 1469-1472.Full text is available at: http://epubs.surrey.ac.uk/726752/
Abstract
A new form of G distribution, called the dual-texture G distribution, is proposed for Single-Look Complex (SLC) PolSAR data. Unlike the scalar texture productmodel, the dual texture G distribution is derived considering different texture variables for co-pol and cross-pol (x-pol) channels. The co-pol and x-pol texture variables are modelled by the Generalized Inverse Gaussian (GIG) distribution, separately. The result is a more flexible multivariate distribution. Also Mellin Kind Statistics (MKS) are utilized to analyze GIG textures, observe evidence of dual texture and to estimate shape parameters.
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(2012) 'CANOPY CLASSIFICATION WITH S-BAND POLARIMETRIC SAR DATA'. IEEE IEEE International Geoscience and Remote Sensing Symposium IGARSS 2012, pp. 6535-6538.Full text is available at: http://epubs.surrey.ac.uk/726893/
Abstract
New Synthetic Aperture Radar (SAR) missions in S-band are currently under design but the potential performance of this microwave frequency is still under discussion. This paper presents the outcomes of a study on canopy classification carried out with fully polarimetric S- and X-band datasets contemporaneously acquired by the Astrium airborne SAR demonstrator. Classical polarimetric decompositions have been applied to investigate the S-band capabilities in vegetation monitoring and preliminary results are here presented.
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(2012) 'FLOODING LEVEL ESTIMATION IN URBAN AREAS WITH SAR IMAGES'. GOLD ConferenceFull text is available at: http://epubs.surrey.ac.uk/726874/
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(2012) 'Validation of S-band data performance for future spaceborne SAR missions'. IEEE EUSAR. 9th European Conference on Synthetic Aperture Radar, Nuremberg, Germany: EUSAR 2012, pp. 75-78.Full text is available at: http://epubs.surrey.ac.uk/711817/
Abstract
Most of the SAR missions of the latest years presented sensors working in X-band (like in the TerraSAR-X and Cosmo-SkyMed missions). Today new SAR missions, working at alternative frequencies like S-band, are under planning/design and will be launched in the upcoming years. In addition, full polarimetry is likely to be implemented in some of those missions. This is the case of the UK sensor NovaSAR-S to be launched by 2013. In order to validate the performance of S-band, especially in comparison with the better known and tested X-band, an airborne demonstrator has been set up to contemporaneously acquire fully polarimetric SAR data in both bands. In this paper we present, compare and discuss results deriving from the application of the H/α and the Pauli decompositions to the fully polarimetric datasets in both bands to understand possible advantages of S-band in specific applications.
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(2012) 'The new form of G distribution for single-look PolSAR data'. IEEE EUSAR. 9th European Conference Synthetic Aperture Radar, Nuremberg, Germany: EUSAR 2012, pp. 523-526.Full text is available at: http://epubs.surrey.ac.uk/711818/
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(2012) 'Geometry-based SAR curvilinear feature selection for damage detection'. IEEE EUSAR. 9th European Conference on Synthetic Aperture Radar, Nuremberg, Germany: EUSAR 2012, pp. 62-65.Full text is available at: http://epubs.surrey.ac.uk/711819/
Abstract
Bright curvilinear features in Synthetic Aperture Radar (SAR) images arising from the geometry of urban structures have been successfully used for estimating urban earthquake damage, using single pre- and post-event high resolution amplitude SAR images. In this paper, further automation of the process of selecting candidate curvilinear features for change detection is proposed, based on a model selection using priors derived from idealised building geometry. The technique is demonstrated using COSMO-SkyMed data covering the 2010 Port-au-Prince earthquake.
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(2011) 'Demonstration and analysis of the applications of S-band SAR'. 2011 3rd International Asia-Pacific Conference on Synthetic Aperture Radar, Seoul, South Korea: 3rd APSAR 2011, pp. 167-170.Full text is available at: http://epubs.surrey.ac.uk/726887/
Abstract
The use of some working frequencies is still novel in Synthetic Aperture Radar (SAR) especially when associated to a full exploitation of polarimetric channels. In this paper the potential value of a spaceborne multi-pol SAR system in S-band (3.2 GHz) is presented following the first acquisitions of the Astrium UK airborne SAR demonstrator and relevant analysis based on Pauli and eigenvalue-eigenvector decompositions. Most interesting results are presented and discussed.
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(2011) 'An application of the deterministic feature extraction approach to COSMO-SKyMed data'. Proceedings of the European Conference on Synthetic Aperture Radar, Aachen (germany): EUSAR10, pp. 1014-1017.Full text is available at: http://epubs.surrey.ac.uk/726886/
Abstract
In the last years a new feature extraction approach from a single amplitude SAR image of urban areas has been introduced by the authors. In this paper they discuss the feasibility of this approach to detect changes in urban areas when natural hazards occur, with the aim to identify damaged or collapsed buildings by monitoring changes in the radiometric content of relevant SAR images. The test is performed on COSMO-SKyMed data provided before and after the earthquake that took place in the area around L¿Aquila, Italy, in April 2009. First results are presented and discussed.
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(2011) 'A SAR image-based tool for prompt and effective earthquake response'. IEEE Proceedings of 2011 Joint Urban Remote Sensing Event, Munich, Germany: JURSE 2011, pp. 213-216.Full text is available at: http://epubs.surrey.ac.uk/533444/
Abstract
Recently, a new concept for detection of damaged infrastructure after earthquakes has been introduced, based on analysis of double reflection lines in SAR images. This paper describes the development of a processing step for extraction of double-reflection lines, and its implementation. In particular, an unsupervised bright line detector working on the ratio of pre- and post-event single look complex SAR data is introduced, and is demonstrated using COSMO-SkyMed SAR data from the 2009 L'Aquila earthquake.
- . (2011) 'Feasibility of time-frequency urban area analysis on TerraSAR-X fully polarimetric dataset'. IEEE Proceedings of 2011 Joint Urban Remote Sensing Event, Munich, Germany: JURSE 2011, pp. 265-268.
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(2011) 'Bright line detection in COSMO-SkyMed SAR images of urban areas'. IEEE Proceeedings of Joint Urban Remote Sensing Event, Munich, Germany: JURSE 2011, pp. 253-256.Full text is available at: http://epubs.surrey.ac.uk/533445/
Abstract
Bright lines are a characteristic feature of synthetic aperture radar (SAR) amplitude images of urban areas, and are commonly associated with man-made structures. In order to aid in the development of SAR applications using these features, an automated approach to bright line detection is proposed, based on scale-space ridge detection at a single scale, and using a naïve Bayesian classification step to select the ridge points corresponding to bright lines. The effectiveness of the technique is demonstrated by applying it to a COSMO-SkyMed image of L'Aquila, Italy.
- . (2011) 'A new local approach for flooding level estimation in urban areas using single SAR images'. IEEE Proceedings of 2011 Joint Urban Remote Sensing Event, Munich, Germany: JURSE 2011, pp. 257-260.
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(2010) 'Introduction of Podcasts in Remote Sensing Education'. IEEE Proceedings of the IEEE International Geoscience and Remote Sensing Symposium, Honolulu, USA: IGARSS'10, pp. 1104-1106.Full text is available at: http://epubs.surrey.ac.uk/533418/
Abstract
This paper deals with a new teaching experience carried on at the Department of Electronic Engineering at University of Surrey. The experience is based on the enhancement of students learning in the Satellite Remote Sensing class with the adoption of new technologies for assessment and teaching purposes. More precisely, podcasts have been introduced in a 3-year long project as supporting teaching material or coursework. Here the experience of the first year, where podcasts are introduced as group coursework, is described in detailed and commented.
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(2010) 'MONITORING OF COLLAPSED BUILT-UP AREAS WITH HIGH RESOLUTION SAR IMAGES'. IEEE 2010 IEEE INTERNATIONAL GEOSCIENCE AND REMOTE SENSING SYMPOSIUM, Honolulu, HI: IEEE International Geoscience and Remote Sensing Symposium, pp. 2422-2425.Full text is available at: http://epubs.surrey.ac.uk/726888/
- . (2010) 'Fast Change Detection Algorithm for Single Post-Earthquake SAR Images of Urban Areas'. SIEm Proceedings of the 18th RiNEm, Beneveneto, Italy: RiNEm
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(2009) 'Electromagnetic Modelling for Information Extraction from High Resolution SAR Images of Urban Areas'. IEEE Proceedings of the IEEE International Geoscience and Remote Sensing Symposium '08, Boston (Massachusetts, USA): IGARSS'08 1, pp. I-78-I-81.Full text is available at: http://epubs.surrey.ac.uk/726881/
Abstract
Analysis, interpretation and feature extraction concerning High Resolution (HR) Synthetic Aperture Radar (SAR) images of urban areas urgently require support of sound and appropriate electromagnetic modelling. The modelling takes into consideration the radar geometry and the (geometric and electromagnetic) scene parameters but also the novelty brought by high resolution. In this paper, this way of developing suitable electromagnetic modelling for HR SAR images of urban areas is shown to be successful as able to interpret and retrieve, from these scenarios, new and interesting details that will certainly represent the main actor of next generation of applications for urban areas with SAR sensors.
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(2009) 'SAR monitoring of suburban areas based on an electromagnetic scattering model'. IEEE International Geoscience and Remote Sensing Symposium (IGARSS), Cape Town: International Geoscience and Remote Sensing Symposium (IGARSS) 5, pp. V104-V107.Full text is available at: http://epubs.surrey.ac.uk/533333/
Abstract
Cylindrical-shape tanks are typical of any suburban area and often contain dangerous gases or fluids. In this paper, we suggest a way to monitor them by means of high resolution Synthetic Aperture Radar (SAR) images and a scattering model able to quantitatively consider how the radar signal interacts with this kind of structures and how they appear m the SAR images. Adopting the model, geometrical information as the tank height is retrieved from the SAR images m a non-conventional way that is exploiting the information content contained m the double reflection contribution to the radar cross section. Results are compared with more traditional methods and discussed.
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(2008) 'TerraSAR-X for urban areas monitoring: novelties and promises of High Resolution'. Oberpfaffenhofen, Munich (Germany): TerraSAR-X Science Team MeetingFull text is available at: http://epubs.surrey.ac.uk/726884/
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(2008) 'New Models for the Analysis of High Resolution SAR Images of Urban Areas'. Proceedings of the IEEE GOLD Conference, Frascati (Italy): IEEE GOLD ConferenceFull text is available at: http://epubs.surrey.ac.uk/726882/
- . (2008) 'Building Feature Extraction via a Deterministic Approach: Application to Real High Resolution SAR Images'. IEEE Barcelona (Spain): IGARSS'07, pp. 2681-2684.
- . (2007) 'Accuracy of Building Height Estimation from SAR images'. IEEE Proceedings of the IEEE International Geoscience and Remote Sensing Symposium '06, Denver (Colorado,USA): IGARSS'06, pp. 3647-3650.
- . (2007) 'Simulation Tools for Interpretation of High Resolution SAR Images of Urban Areas'. Paris (France): 4rd RSS/ISPRS joint Symposium on Remote Sensing and Data Fusion over Urban Areas
- . (2007) 'ELECTROMAGNETIC FEATURE EXTRACTION FROM REAL SAR IMAGES OF BUILT-UP AREAS'. Proceedings of the 27th Symposium of the European Association of Remote Sensing Laboratories (EARSeL), Bolzano, Italy: 27th EARSeL Symposium: Geoinformation in Europe
- . (2006) 'ANALISI DI SENSIBILITA’ PER LA STIMA DELL’ALTEZZA DI EDIFICI DA IMMAGINI SAR'. Genova, Italy: XVI RiNEm
- . (2006) 'VERIFICA DI UN SOFTWARE PER LA PREVISIONE DELLA RADIOCOPERTURA'. Genova, Italy: XVI RiNEm
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(2005) 'Models for Features Extraction from SAR images of Urban Areas'. Proceedings of the XXVIIIth URSI General Assembly, New Delhi (India): URSI 2005Full text is available at: http://epubs.surrey.ac.uk/726879/
- . (2005) 'Deterministic Extraction of Building Parameters from High Resolution SAR Images'. Proceedings of the 3rd RSS/ISPRS joint Symposium on Remote Sensing and Data Fusion over Urban Areas, Tempe (Arizona,USA): Symposium on Remote Sensing and Data Fusion over Urban Areas
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(2004) 'Efficient Hybrid Stripmap/Spotlight SAR Raw Signal Simulation'. IEEE Proceedings of the IEEE International Geoscience and Remote Sensing Symposium '04, Anchorage (Alaska, USA): IGARSS'04 3, pp. 1767-1769.Full text is available at: http://epubs.surrey.ac.uk/726880/
Abstract
Recently, a new operating mode for Synthetic Aperture Radar (SAR) system, referred to as hybrid stripmap/spotlight mode, has been presented [1-2]. In the hybrid acquisition mode the radar antenna beam is steered about a point farther away from the radar than the area being illuminated, thus generating microwave images with an azimuth resolution better than that achieved in the stripmap configuration, and a ground coverage better than the one of the spotlight configuration. The subject of design, processing and data interpretation for the hybrid SAR mode is gaining an increasing interest in the remote sensing scientific community. Consequently, a hybrid SAR raw signal simulator is strongly required, especially when real raw data are not available yet, to test processing algorithms and to help mission planning. In addition, to analyse the effects of processing errors and to verify the impact of different system design choices on the final image for different kinds of imaged scenes, an extended scene SAR raw signal simulator simulator is very useful: it is what we present in this paper. After showing that in this case a 2D Fourier domain approach is not viable, we demonstrate that a 1D range Fourier domain approach, followed by 1D azimuth time domain integration, is possible when some approximations, usually valid in the actual cases, are accepted.
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(2004) 'A New Efficient Simulator for Hybrid SAR Raw Signals'. IEEE Napoli (Italy): IEEE GOLD Remote Sensing Conference ConferenceFull text is available at: http://epubs.surrey.ac.uk/726875/
Teaching
Satellite Remote Sensing
Laboratories, Design and Professional Studies I
Laboratories, Design and Professional Studies II
Departmental Duties
She is promoter for the ERASMUS programme between SSC and University of Naples Federico II (Italy).
Affiliations
Raffaella is a member of the IEEE Geoscience and Remote Sensing Society.PhD Programme
Possible work areas and topics
Earth observation
- Urban areas monitoring with high resolution SAR images
- UK forests monitoring with optical, infrared and radar imagery
- Carbon stocks mapping
- SAR polarimetry for land mapping
- Maritime surveillance
- Mines detection with remote sensing imagery
- Remote sensing data fusion over urban areas
Disaster monitoring
- Detection of flooded areas with optical and SAR images
- Detection of damaged urban areas after earthquake in SAR images
Technology
- S-band SAR
Requirements
You hold a first class honours degree in Engineering, Physics or Maths. You have knowledge of Remote Sensing and interest in Earth Observation and Disaster Monitoring, together with familiarity with at least one of the following fields: Electromagnetics, Image Processing, Geographical Information Systems (GIS).
Creative and hard-working profiles are particularly encouraged.
Other skills
Experience with IDL and/or ENVI software is an advantage.
