# Optical-SAR data fusion
*analysis . methodologies*

Combines optical reflectance and SAR backscatter to exploit complementary information; good for cloud-persistent monitoring, crop classification under cloud cover, and flood mapping in vegetated areas.

## Specifications
- **family**: Fusion
- **requirements envelope**: {"kind":"fusion","integration_pattern":"feature-level"}
- **entity type**: methodology
- **last verified date**: 2026-05-22
- **verified by**: sw
- **claim status**: unclaimed
- **subtype**: analysis
- **attributes**: {"family":"Fusion","summary":"Combines optical reflectance and SAR backscatter to exploit complementary information; good for cloud-persistent monitoring, crop classification under cloud cover, and flood mapping in vegetated areas.","requirements_envelope":"{\"kind\":\"fusion\",\"integration_pattern\":\"feature-level\"}","kind":"analysis"}

## Editorial
Feature-level or decision-level fusion; SAR provides all-weather geometric structure while optical provides spectral identity. Requires co-registration and calibration consistency across sensors. [Wikipedia: Data fusion](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Data_fusion)

## Sources
- [wikipedia] | Wikipedia: Data fusion | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Data_fusion | tier=community | accessed=2026-05-22

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Source: https://eo-atlas.org/methodologies/optical-sar-fusion
Maintainer: SpectraWorks B.V. (CC-BY 4.0)