Resolution enhancement of WISDOM/ExoMars radar soundings applied on potential Martian analogs

Abstract : The WISDOM ground penetrating radar aboard the Rosalind Franklin rover of the ExoMars 2022 mission will provide radar images of the Martian shallow subsurface down to a few meters and with a vertical resolution of a few centimetres. Such a high resolution imaging of the subsurface will be key in understanding the geological context and guiding the sample acquisition by the rover’s drill. In order to enhance WISDOM resolution and meet the desired 3-cm value (the length of the samples that will be collected), a super-resolution technique known as the “Bandwidth Extrapolation” (BWE) is applied to WISDOM data. The BWE is validated on synthetic and laboratory data before being applied to observations acquired in a variety of potential Martian analog environments.