Multiscale fusion of INSAR data for improved topographic mapping

INSAR data from the ERS-1/2 platforms are combined with multiple sets of data acquired by the NASA/JPL TOPSAR platform to obtain statistically optimal high-resolution estimates of topography over the Finke River Gorge in central Australia. The INSAR data are fused using a multiscale Kalman smoother. The estimated topography preserves the spatial resolution of the TOPSAR data while smoothing noise and providing estimates where there was no TOPSAR coverage. It is shown that the estimation error associated with the multiscale Kalman smoother is smaller than that obtained with a deterministic least squares approach.