Patent ID: 8665144

Claim:
A method comprising: propagating polarized radar signals to a region of interest using a dual-polarization radar transmitter; collecting sampled co-polar time series radar data scattered within the region of interest with the dual-polarization radar transmitter, wherein the co-polar time series radar data includes vertically polarized data and horizontally polarized data; creating, using a computer system, a summed likelihood function by adding a likelihood function for the first time series radar data and a likelihood function for the second time series radar data; maximizing, using the computer system, the summed likelihood function to estimate the spectral moments of the first time series radar data and the second time series radar data; and determining, using the computer system, at least one of the differential propagation phase and the co-polar correlation coefficient between the horizontally polarized data and the vertically polarized data from a complex linear combination of the vertically polarized data and horizontally polarized data.