NISAR

NASA is providing NISAR’s L-band SAR, a high-rate communications subsystem for science data, GPS receivers, a solid-state recorder, and the payload data subsystem.

A U.S. Air Force C-17 cargo plane carried the NISAR payload to Bengaluru.

JPL is providing NISAR’s radar reflector antenna, deployable boom, high-rate communication subsystem for science data, GPS receivers, a solid-state recorder, and the payload data subsystem.

The NISAR (NASA-ISRO Synthetic Aperture Radar) Earth-observing radar satellite's first images offer a glimpse of the mission's upcoming full science operations.

NISAR tracks changes in land and ice surfaces on Earth.

NISAR released its first images late last month.

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.

Optical images of the New Orleans–Baton Rouge region from other satellites on November 29, 2025 showed the area largely hidden under cloud layers while NISAR's radar imaged it.

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.

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.

NISAR's L-band radar uses microwaves with a wavelength of about 9 inches (24 centimeters).

Bright green patches west of the Mississippi River in the NISAR image outline healthy forested areas where tree canopies and understorey vegetation scatter L-band microwaves.

L-band radar signals from NISAR can penetrate clouds that would obscure optical sensors and return detailed information about the land surface below.

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 Alaska Satellite Facility Distributed Active Archive Center in Fairbanks, Alaska, will host and distribute NISAR L-band radar data products worldwide as part of NASA's network of synthetic aperture radar archives.

NISAR data are expected to support disaster response, infrastructure inspection, and other applications requiring frequent, cloud-penetrating, day-or-night imaging.

Operating in dual-frequency mode, NISAR will revisit and map Earth's land and ice areas twice every 12 days, producing dense time series of radar observations.

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 L-band imagery resolves agricultural parcels on both sides of the Mississippi River, with darker tones suggesting fallow fields and bright magenta pixels indicating areas with tall crops.

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.