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In this study, we aimed to evaluate the capacity of TanDEM-X interferometric synthetic aperture radar (InSAR) data to estimate canopy height with the assistance of an external digital terrain model (DTM). A ground-to-volume ratio estimation model was proposed so that the canopy height could be precisely estimated from the random-volume-over-ground (RVoG) model. We also refined the RVoG inversion process with the relationship between the estimated penetration depth (PD) and the phase center height (PCH). The proposed method was tested by TanDEM-X InSAR data acquired over relatively homogenous coniferous forests (Teruel test site) and coniferous as well as broadleaved forests (La Rioja test site) in Spain. Comparing the TanDEM-X-derived height with the LiDAR-derived height at plots of size 50 m \u00d7 50 m, the root-mean-square error (RMSE) was 1.71 m (R2 = 0.88) in coniferous forests of Teruel and 1.97 m (R2 = 0.90) in La Rioja. To demonstrate the advantage of the proposed method, existing methods based on ignoring ground scattering contribution, fixing extinction, and assisting with simulated spaceborne LiDAR data were compared. The impacts of penetration and terrain slope on the RVoG inversion were also evaluated. The results show that when a DTM is available, the proposed method has the optimal performance on forest height estimation.<\/jats:p>","DOI":"10.3390\/rs15235517","type":"journal-article","created":{"date-parts":[[2023,11,27]],"date-time":"2023-11-27T07:56:10Z","timestamp":1701071770000},"page":"5517","update-policy":"https:\/\/doi.org\/10.3390\/mdpi_crossmark_policy","source":"Crossref","is-referenced-by-count":4,"title":["Forest Height Inversion by Combining Single-Baseline TanDEM-X InSAR Data with External DTM Data"],"prefix":"10.3390","volume":"15","author":[{"ORCID":"https:\/\/orcid.org\/0000-0003-4592-9174","authenticated-orcid":false,"given":"Wenjie","family":"He","sequence":"first","affiliation":[{"name":"School of Geosciences and Info-Physics, Central South University, Changsha 410083, China"}],"role":[{"role":"author","vocabulary":"crossref"}]},{"given":"Jianjun","family":"Zhu","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"School of Geosciences and Info-Physics, Central South University, Changsha 410083, China"}],"role":[{"role":"author","vocabulary":"crossref"}]},{"ORCID":"https:\/\/orcid.org\/0000-0002-4216-5175","authenticated-orcid":false,"given":"Juan M.","family":"Lopez-Sanchez","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"Signals, Systems and Telecommunications Group, Instituto Universitario de Investigaci\u00f3n Inform\u00e1tica, University of Alicante, 03080 Alicante, Spain"}],"role":[{"role":"author","vocabulary":"crossref"}]},{"ORCID":"https:\/\/orcid.org\/0000-0002-2756-0863","authenticated-orcid":false,"given":"Cristina","family":"G\u00f3mez","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"iuFOR-EiFAB, Campus Duques de Soria, University of Valladolid, 42004 Soria, Spain"},{"name":"Department of Geography and Environment, School of Geoscience, University of Aberdeen, Aberdeen AB24 3UE, UK"}],"role":[{"role":"author","vocabulary":"crossref"}]},{"given":"Haiqiang","family":"Fu","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"School of Geosciences and Info-Physics, Central South University, Changsha 410083, China"}],"role":[{"role":"author","vocabulary":"crossref"}]},{"given":"Qinghua","family":"Xie","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"School of Geography and Information Engineering, China University of Geoscience (Wuhan), Wuhan 430074, China"}],"role":[{"role":"author","vocabulary":"crossref"}]}],"member":"1968","published-online":{"date-parts":[[2023,11,27]]},"reference":[{"key":"ref_1","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"367","DOI":"10.1109\/LGRS.2019.2925901","article-title":"Comparison of Aboveground Biomass Estimation From InSAR and LiDAR Canopy Height Models in Tropical Forests","volume":"17","author":"Schlund","year":"2020","journal-title":"IEEE Geosci. 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