A class of singular Fourier integral operators in Synthetic Aperture Radar imaging

In this article, we analyze the microlocal properties of the linearized forward scattering operator F and the normal operator F⁎F (where F⁎ is the L2 adjoint of F) which arises in Synthetic Aperture Radar imaging for the common midpoint acquisition geometry. When F⁎ is applied to the scattered data, artifacts appear. We show that F⁎F can be decomposed as a sum of four operators, each belonging to a class of distributions associated to two cleanly intersecting Lagrangians, Ip,l(Λ0,Λ1), thereby explaining the latter artifacts.