Evaluation of SAR systems for hydrological monitoring of wetlands in the Paraná River delta
Submitted: 2026-02-27
|Accepted: 2026-05-27
|Published: 2026-06-16
Copyright (c) 2026 Verónica Mariela Kwaterka, María Mercedes Salvia, Laura Mariel Calfayan, Jonathan Tissoni, Rafael Grimson
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License.
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Keywords:
Remote sensing, SAR, hydrodynamics, wetlands, Parana River delta
Supporting agencies:
Esta investigación fue posible gracias al financiamiento de la Agencia Nacional de Promoción Científica y Tecnológica (ANPCyT) de Argentina y a la Agencia Japonesa de Exploración Aeroespacial (JAXA) por la provisión de imágenes satelitales ALOS-2 a través del convenio colaborativo ER3A2N547 en el marco de la convocatoria EO-RA3 del Centro de Inve
Abstract:
In this study, different acquisition configurations of Synthetic Aperture Radar (SAR) systems were
evaluated for hydrological monitoring of wetland ecosystems located in the inner islands of the Paraná River
Delta, considering variations in wavelength, polarization, and incidence angle. For this purpose, we analyzed the
variations of the backscattered signal in island cores dominated by cortadera (Scirpus giganteus) using three
temporal series of ALOS-2 PALSAR-2 and Sentinel-1 satellite imagery, in relation to ordinary fluctuations in
inundation conditions. Since the backscattered signal in wetland environments is influenced by multiple factors
such as water level and soil saturation, surface roughness, and vegetation phenological state; generalized additive
models (GAM) were applied to analyze how these factors contribute to the variability of the backscattered signal for
each satellite acquisition configuration. The results of this research indicate that the most suitable configuration
for monitoring the hydrological dynamics of the Paraná River Delta wetlands corresponds to L-band SAR, with HH
polarization and steeper incidence angles. This is because the combination of L-band with steep incidence angles
(<28°) enhances penetration of the signal through cortadera vegetation, providing information more sensitive to
inundation conditions within the wetland.
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