ISRO provided the NISAR spacecraft bus and contributed an S-band SAR operating at a wavelength of about 4 inches (10 centimeters) to complement the L-band system.
The NISAR spacecraft collects data with a deployable drum-shaped radar reflector that spans about 39 feet (12 meters) in diameter.
NISAR is the first satellite mission to fly two synthetic aperture radar instruments at different wavelengths on the same platform.
The Maurepas Swamp region west of Lake Pontchartrain and Lake Maurepas displays a mottled yellow-and-magenta pattern in the NISAR image indicative of thinning tree stands and changes within the wetland forest ecosystem.
Other parts of New Orleans appear magenta in the NISAR L-band color composite where street grids run parallel to the satellite track, producing bright reflections from building walls.
NISAR demonstrated that L-band SAR can discriminate between low-lying vegetation, taller trees, engineered infrastructure, and urban development for monitoring forest, wetland, and crop conditions.
Mission scientists used preliminary NISAR L-band measurements to generate a color composite in which different hues correspond to distinct land cover types and structural characteristics on the ground.
L-band radar signals from NISAR can penetrate clouds that would obscure optical sensors and return detailed information about the land surface below.
As NISAR completed post-launch commissioning, the project prepared to release thousands of data products in late February to enable routine analysis of global L-band observations by researchers and resource managers.
NISAR's L-band synthetic aperture radar acquired an image spanning New Orleans, Baton Rouge, the Mississippi River between them, nearby communities, and surrounding wetlands, farmlands, and forests on November 29, 2025.
NISAR is a joint Earth-observing mission developed by NASA and the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) to routinely monitor changes on Earth's land and ice surfaces over the life of the mission.
NISAR distributed a smaller set of sample products that demonstrate file formats and processing approaches for upcoming datasets ahead of the larger data release.
NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory leads the U.S. contribution to NISAR, manages the U.S. science team, and built the mission's L-band SAR instrument and its deployable antenna reflector.
The NISAR L-band radar image resolves the Lake Pontchartrain Causeway, where the twin bridges stretch nearly 24 miles (about 39 kilometers), making them the longest continuous bridge structure over open water in the world.
The NISAR spacecraft launched on July 30 from the Satish Dhawan Space Centre on the southeastern coast of India and now operates in orbit collecting radar data.
The NASA-ISRO Synthetic Aperture Radar (NISAR) satellite is designed to collect higher-resolution data than previous satellites.
NISAR will systematically gather imagery of nearly every bridge in the world twice every 12 days.
Comprehensive time-series radar data from NISAR will allow civil engineers to observe trends and stress points with greater clarity.
SpaceX has performed a total of 6 science mission launches for NASA in 2023, including NISAR and EscaPADE.
The InSAR services will use data from satellites such as the Sentinel-1, NISAR, and TerraSAR-X constellations.