Abstract
In the present research, the authors examined the effects of the rice density and background to the results of four component decomposition (Yamaguchi et al., 2005), which is one of the most effective approaches for the polarimetric scattering analysis. Rice plants under different densities and background conditions were used, and the X-band polarimetric scattering of rice were measured in an anechoic radio wave chamber in Niigata Univ. in September 2, 2008. The measured data were decomposed into different scattering components by four component decomposition. It was found that X-band scattering had little effects of the background differences under the normal density, while the scattering under the less density was more sensitive to the background. In addition, the saturated condition of soil water without rice showed much stronger surface backscattering than the non-inundated condition without rice. As rice fields are usually inundated in most of the planting season, it can be concluded that the accurate analysis of microwave scattering from rice field requires the rice height and the density.
