On the effects of acquisition parameters and surface properties in sea oil seep observation by means of high-resolution SAR

In this study, a comprehensive analysis of X-band backscattering from sea oil seeps is undertaken exploiting: 1) a two- scale scattering model to predict vv-polarized sea surface backscattering with and without oil slicks under different wind speeds and incidence angles; 2) a large time-series of co-polarized dual-polarimetric Synthetic Aperture Radar imagery collected by the German TerraSAR-X mission over the well-known oil seep related to the Taylor Energy accident occurred in 2004 in the Gulf of Mexico