Fast and Accurate Computation of the Multilook Interferometric Phase Probability Density Function

This letter reports a method to compute the multilook interferometric phase probability density function (pdf) used in interferometric synthetic aperture radar (InSAR). The method is fast and accurate for at least 10 000 looks and the full range of interferometric correlations. This is accomplished by computing the products of large and small numbers in the underlying hypergeometric series logarithmically and by deriving a single-term recursion relation to accelerate the computation. This letter extends the usable range of inputs to the multilook interferometric phase pdf for radar systems with a large number of looks and the entire practical range of interferometric correlation.