Slashdot Mirror
Super-Sensitive Spray-On Explosive Detector
esocid writes "US scientists have designed a new spray-on explosive detector sensitive enough to detect just a billionth of a gram of (nitrogen-containing) explosive. After treatment, the explosive glows blue under UV light, making the detector perfect for use in the field. The silafluorene-fluorene copolymer can detect explosives at much lower levels than existing systems because it detects particles instead of explosive vapors, and is able to show the difference between nitrate esters (trinitroglycerin) and nitroaromatic explosives (TNT). The team is currently working on a similar system to detect peroxide-based explosives and say they hope to be able to investigate perchlorates and organic nitrates, too."
95% percent of our paper money contains microscopic amounts of cocaine, imagine if we use such sensitive equipment to detect it. We'd all be locked up. Mmmm...maybe that's the intention.
What?
So, can it detect glycerin? I think it's found in many skin care products.
Then again, is there any information on the number of false positives of this thing?
Tie two birds together: although they have four wings, they cannot fly. (The blind man)
I lost faith in the current airport explosives detectors when I found out that Bondo products set them off. It was a hilarious hour or so watching a broken system thrash about trying to figure out why their machine kept beeping when there were clearly no explosives in my bag.
Did I mention that this was after a Defcon in the Las Vegas airport?
I lost what little respect I had in the system (note: Not the people you would ever see on the floor, they have been pretty OK for the most part) at that point.
Between the War On Moisture, pointless shoe removal, and a TSA that can't ever answer any question with the word 'Why' in it, I have absolutely zero faith in the system any more.
I am a frequent flier, put in over 100K miles last year and am on track to do more than that this year. If you simply go through the airports enough, you can trivially avoid any security measure there is, it isn't even a trick.
So, spray on bomb detectors? Great. So? Send the bad guys through security 25 times and you will see several obvious ways to not get it checked. Game over.
-Charlie
I never understood what happens when an airport baggage handler gets a second job as a landscaper, and comes to work every day covered in nitrates, and spreads it on everyone's luggages? How do chemical detectors deal with all these sources of noise?
Actually, I'd also worry if I were you, if you've played cards or pingpong, or played guitar (if the guitar itself isn't lacquered with it, the guitar pick is made of the damn thing), or if you've held hands with your SO who uses nail polish, or a few other cases. That's for nitrocellulose alone, best known as guncotton and the primary component in cordite. (Modern gunpowder, sorta.) Also the primary component in celluloid, hence the above list.
IIRC the UK has a famous case where they threw 3 Irish guys in jail for having played cards on a long train trip. Had nitrates all over their hands.
So, well, while the Irish and Brits seem to have mostly learned to live with each other lately, I'd start worrying if you look like an Arab and travel to/in the USA.
A polar bear is a cartesian bear after a coordinate transform.
http://www.scribd.com/doc/1809825/Environmental-Protection-Agency-flourene
Well, OK, technically it's silaflourene, but that has a good chance of being worse.
I really think you don't want this stuff sprayed on you.
I don't know about gardening, but I worked in a research lab with lots of nitrates.
My laptop bag is forever *highly* positive for nitrates, just from being in the room.
I already have my explanation down, because I get stopped every time I get swabbed.
The good news is, you automatically deal with a supervisor when that happens. TSA line
staff are mostly working their first job out of high school, or vocational rehab. But
their management folks tend to be people with some experience in law enforcement and/or
military service. Some of them are at least capable of comprehending what you say when
you explain you're an academic researcher who works in an agriculture lab at a university
they've heard of. Helps a lot if you can flash laminated badges, especially if one of them
indicates government clearance higher than their own.
I'll never leave for a flight with less than two hours to spare, though.
actually, I was thinking more fun would be to get you rhands on the chemicals that are used to train dogs to smell for drugs. A few tiny sprays of "Ode de Cocaine" should keep them busy for a while.
-Steve
"I opened my eyes, and everything went dark again"
Black powder is based on potassium nitrate (and charcoal and sulfur), but so is the salt substitute I use in my low-sodium diet.
I suspect that I probably have enough potassium nitrate on everything I own to leave trace on everything that touches anything I own.
Given the extreme sensitivity of this solution, my entire world would probably glow blue.
Of course anyone who just ate fries at MacDonalds has hands just COVERED in nitrates (sodium nitrate - plain old table salt)...
I question how useful this is in the real world.
--Tomas
Agreed: You want to do it right, you need to model the operations of Israeli airport/airline security.
The impressive thing was the flight INTO IL: Transferring in the EU, over an hour before boarding, 2 cars pulled up to the plane and unloaded non-uniformed armed security who inspected, then surrounded the plane, and remained in sight of each other at all times. This was long before we saw the security crew for us appear and setup their podia to perform the aforementioned interviews. The interview was very little, but eye contact was absolutely constant after the document review. Plus an old-fashioned second xray of the carry ons. It was very smooth, thorough and no doubt expensive.
Ben Gurion, for the flight out, was as-described, minus the wait: At 5am on a Saturday, it's rather quiet.
Interesting at TLV: the security interviews (2 plus bag searches for those without special letters) were all conducted by young women. The entire crew was 90% women, and no one looked older than mid 30's. Couldn't figure out if those observations were the results of scheduling, or a choice for strategic reasons.
My take on all of this is there is absolutely no substitute for an attentive person simply interviewing. US Customs has known this for years, it cannot be outsourced, it takes time to train these folks, a minor amount of time for us, and seems to be working. All reasons why Security Theater has no reason to fear: inertia will keep us on the current path well past every threshold of ridiculosity we could ever possibly imagine.
About the only mechanical explosion I can think of would be compressed gas, and you are gonna have a hard time explaining to Security why you are toting those big compressed gas tanks onto a plane.