INSTITUTE OF PHYSICS PUBLISHING WAVES IN RANDOM MEDIA Waves Random Media 12 (2002) 387–397 PII: S0959-7174(02)34424-0 Backscattering enhancement for partially convex targets of large sizes in continuous random media for E-wave incidence Hosam El-Ocla 1 and Mitsuo Tateiba 2 1 Department of Computer Science, Lakehead University, 955 Oliver Road, Thunder Bay, Ontario, Canada P7B 5E1 2 Faculty of Information Science and Electrical Engineering, Department of Computer Science and Communication Engineering, Kyushu University, 6-10-1, Hakozaki, Higashi-ku, Fukuoka 812-8581, Japan E-mail: hosam@flash.lakeheadu.ca Received 28 February 2002, in final form 27 April 2002 Published 28 May 2002 Online at stacks.iop.org/WRM/12/387 Abstract The shape of the target constitutes an important factor in the radar detection problem. In a previous study, the enhancement in the radar cross section (ERCS) has proved to be affected largely by the target parameters as well as the effects of the double passage and the spatial coherence length of incident waves around the target. However, the target size was limited to about less than one wavelength. Here, we estimate numerically the RCS of targets taking large sizes of more than three wavelengths, and analyse the characteristics of RCS. Moreover, we investigate the ERCS phenomenon of such targets under different circumstances of random medium and target configuration. In this regard, we assume partially convex targets in continuous random media and also horizontal incident wave polarization (E-wave incidence). 1. Introduction The problem of electromagnetic-wave scattering from targets is an interesting field that has been studied by many researchers over many decades. At the beginning, this problem was investigated for targets in free space. A number of methods proposed to formulate the scattering field were presented: examples are in [1–3]. On the other hand, scattering of electromagnetic waves from targets embedded in random media has become of great importance in the fields of radar engineering and remote sensing, in particular under the condition that the backscattering enhancement occurs [4]. The backscattering enhancement produced due to the double passage effect on waves propagating in random media has also attracted considerable attention among condensed-matter physicists, resulting in a large number of publications [5–7]. 0959-7174/02/030387+11$30.00 © 2002 IOP Publishing Ltd Printed in the UK 387