Backscattering properties of multi-scale rough surfaces

In this paper a novel multi-scale roughness description is presented and it s impact on surface backscattering is investigated. The analysed rough surf aces are synthesised by exploiting a Karhunen-Loeve decomposition of 1/f ra ndom processes in terms of wavelet bases. For these surfaces, relevant roug hness parameters are not traditional quantities like the height profile std (s) and the profile correlation length (I) but they are a new set of parame ters related to the surface multi-scale properties. Besides, the paper inve stigates the possibility of matching the multi-scale roughness description with e.m. asymptotic models such as the Integral Equation Method (IEM). Und er appropriate hypothesis, it is shown that the IEM model can be adapted to the multi-scale roughness description and a sensitive analysis of copolari sed backscattering coefficients to relevant roughness parameters is carried out in the case of one dimensional surfaces.