A LOW-COST NEUTRON TRANSMISSION/SCATTERING TECHNIQUE FOR EXPLOSIVE DETECTION.

A NOVEL TECHNIQUE IS PROPOSED USING A COMMERCIALLY AVAILABLE LOW-FLUX, ISOTOPIC SOURCE AND MULTIPLE DETECTORS FOR SPECTRAL TRANSMISSION/SCATTERING RADIATION DATA TO OBTAIN CHARACTERISTIC SIGNATURES OF EXPLOSIVE MATERIALS. THE AMOUNT AND ENERGY OF SCATTERING DEPENDS ON THE DENSITY, COMPOSITION AND SPATIAL DISTRIBUTION OF THE MATERIAL, WHILE NEUTRON TRANSMISSION DEPENDS ON THE ATTENUATION CAPABILITY OF THE MATERIAL. THE INFORMATION CARRID BY TRANSMISSION AND SCATTERING COMPLEMENT EACH OTHER AND THEIR COMBINED MESSAGE WOULD PROVIDE A CONSISTENT INDICATION OF THE STATUS OF THE INTERROGATED MATERIAL. THE ENERGY SPECTRUM OF THE TRANSMITTED/SCATTERED RADIATION WOULD BE MEASURED TO PROVIDE MULTI-ENERGY MEASUREMENT IN A SINGLE NEUTRON EXPOSURE. LABORATORY MEASUREMENTS WOULD ESTABLISH A DATA BASE WHICH WOULD SERVE AS A BASIS FOR DETERMINING THE PRESENCE OF ANY CONCEALED EXPLOSIVES DURING ON-LINE OPERATIONS. COMPARISONS BETWEEN THE SPECIMEN BEING ANALYZED AND THE DATA BASE WOULD BE MADE WITHOUT HUMAN INTERVENTION. GUI SOFTWARE WOULD BE DEVELOPED TO COORDINATE THE DATA ACQUISITION, MANIPULATION AND ALARM SYSTEM. THE PHASE II PROGRAM WOULD ADDRESS THE ENGINEERING DESIGN WORK SUCH AS RELIABILITY, PORTABILITY AND HEALTH ISSUES TO AIRPORT PERSONNEL. THE UNIT DEVELOPED WOULD BE IDEAL FOR SMALL-SIZE AIRPORTS.