On September 17, 1979, scientists from the CAS Institute of Electronics succeeded in obtaining their first microwave remote sensing images from a prototype airborne synthetic aperture radar (SAR) system. Over the past 25 years, Chinese scientists have won many R&D results and remarkable progress in developing SAR and its ground receiving systems.

The application of SAR technology is noted for its unmatched strong points in all-weather and around-the-clock service when providing landform data in the scanning of the earth surface. So, since its emergence in the 1950s, the SAR technology has been in the limelight and its research level acts as the hallmark of the comprehensive strength of a country's S&T development.

The SAR technology finds diverse applications in national economy, including the assessment of the inundated areas and economic losses in a flooding calamity, the sitting of railroads, highways and data-relaying stations for microwave or TV communications. It may be used to find the areas in short of water resources, surveying the limber storage in forests, ore prospecting and localization of oil wells, annual estimation of grain yields and farming pests. In addition, it may play a critical role as a disciplinary pace-setter by promoting and high-speed development of telecommunications, aeronautics and other related research realms.

The SAR technology has played important roles in marine surveys, landform cartography, monitoring and control of natural calamities and decision makings in public service. Their successful operations included the supervision of the 1991 flooding spell surrounding the Taihu Lake, the 1998 flooding calamities in the basins of the Tongting Lake and Poyang Lake, the 2003 deluge in the Huaihe River valley, the aerial design of the Zhongguancun District for New Technology Development and the airborne remote-sensing exploration for the site of the 2008 Olympiad in Beijing. In China's upcoming program of lunar exploration, a microwave remote sensing imaging system will be among the spacecraft's payload.