Smart Gun Barrels with Embedded Fiber Optic Sensors

This proposal details use of an innovative new technology called Time Modulated Ultra Wideband radio, in conjunction with autonomous micro air vehicles to provide reliable, robust, high bandwidth communication between any number of ground stations and anynumber of unmanned ground vehicles. When two TM-UWB radios communicate, each accurately learns their relative distance. In our system, this range data is used by the micro air vehicles for self organization and self healing of the communications network.TM-UWB radios do not transmit continuous radio waves like conventional radio. Only pulses are transmitted, and power is used only during the short duration of those pulses. Pulses in the time domain result in very wideband signals in the frequency domain,which make them almost impossible to intercept and difficult to jam. The lower frequency component of the signal allows the signals to penetrate foliage, walls, and other obstacles, and TM-UWB is almost totally unaffected by multipath interference. TheTM-UWB output stage is a single transistor which is ON or OFF, there is no intermediate frequency, and no up-conversion and no down-conversion. This simplicity is critical for realization of the micro air vehicle, where even a few grams makes a differencein the design.