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Paper-Based Explosives Sensor Made Using an Inkjet
cylonlover writes "Detecting explosives is a vital task both on the battlefield and off, but it requires equipment that, if sensitive enough to detect explosives traces in small quantities, is often expensive, delicate and difficult to construct. Researchers at the Georgia Tech Research Institute have developed a method of manufacturing highly sensitive explosives detectors incorporating RF components using Ink-jet printers. This holds the promise of producing large numbers of detectors at lower cost using local resources."
Explosive termites have been selectively bred to attack paper-based explosives sensors.
it detects anyway?
I'm tired of these articles from clueless reporters, do they not know what a circuit board is? It's simply copper connections between circuits. If you can put liquid copper or any highly conductive metal in a ink cartridge then you can create almost any electrical device with a inkjet printer.
my karma will be here long after I'm gone
The cheaper the detectors get, the more widespread they will become. Is that a good thing? Probably good for the detector producing industry, and for the inkjet printer producers too. But for us, human beings?
Big E-Books are pushing for a ban on paper books on airlines, so they can sell more E-Readers.
Schroedinger's Brexit: The UK is both in and out of the EU at the same time!
RTFS.
Apparently this doesn't detect explosives, anyway - it detects ammonia. The cleaning lady will set off every sensor on the base.
Paper isn't usually the feedstock(cotton fibers are preferred); but my good friend Nitrocellulose is arguably a 'paper-based-explosive'. Heck, assuming your print head can take the pain, you could even use an inkjet to apply the nitric acid to the paper and produce a printed, paper-based explosive for the printed, paper-based explosive detector to detect...
lets ban the export of Laser printers, we can't let this technology get into the hands of the Chinese ..... Oh Wait!
The paper is common enough (and easily to hide) but the liquid oxygen required to make it do something resembling an explosion is difficult to hide.
Well, I might have a way, but it only works on a semi spherical planet in a vacuum.
Look out it's a terr'ist!
"When information is power, privacy is freedom" - Jah-Wren Ryel
http://www.google.nl/search?hl=nl&q=papercraft+bomb&gs_sm=e&gs_upl=650l3477l0l3813l15l10l0l4l4l0l197l1244l4.6l14l0&bav=on.2,or.r_gc.r_pw.,cf.osb&biw=1280&bih=802&um=1&ie=UTF-8&tbm=isch&source=og&sa=N&tab=wi
They seem to be quite common.
Well, we could un-criminalise a lot of substances because it's now a lot easier to detect things that go asplode and prevent them from being where you really don't want to have them.
ORRR... we could ban ammonia entirely because it upsets the sensors. No points for guessing which'll actually happen.
Does it involve rolling the paper into a stick and lighting it on fire?
I wonder how difficult it would be... It is quite common for people with serious respiratory disorders(emphysema and similarly ghastly ones) to have to use supplemental oxygen more or less continually once their lung function drops too far to keep their blood oxygenated with an ordinary atmospheric gas mixture. Given this comparatively common and plausible use(especially common among fairly frail old people that even hardened TSA agents might refrain from gate-raping too violently), you could likely carry a tank without attracting excessive suspicion.
What I don't know is whether you could sneak the somewhat tougher requirements of storing liquid oxygen into a package that appears to be tackling the easier task of storing pressurized gaseous oxygen...
If you're carrying a tank....
Do I need to spell it out?
Ok, Mr. DHS agent, I'll keep it general. Empty tank. Cut off top. Remove concrete from tank. Pack tank with tons of C4, ball bearings, etc, etc. Build a nice mechanical trigger that works off air pressure. Weld tank. Sand/paint. Fill with small amount of O2. Don mask, attend airport, board airplane, leave valve full open and wait for Allah.
Heck, if you're worried about scanners, use propane instead of C4. Still a big bada-boom.
1. Place sample here
2. Fold here
3. Fold here
4. Tightly twist the blue-printed area
5. Light the blue touchpaper and stand well clear.
Presence of explosives is indicated by loud "fwoosh!" noise, bright light and subsequent absence of eyebrows.
In a survey of 100 programmers, 111111 thought that duck-typing was a good idea.
Along with the metal connections, you need semiconductors to make the diodes to do anything interesting with your circuits.
Low cost!?! Have these guys ever tried buying a new ink cartridge for an ink jet printer?
My first program:
Hell Segmentation fault
The real cost here is not that of the sensor. It's the actions you have to take each time an alarm goes off. Lots of people (construction workers etc) handle explosives on a regular basis, and it leaves traces on them and their clothes.
And just wait until teenagers realize that all they have to do to get a day off from school is buy a bag of potassium nitrate at the grocery store and pour some out in the hallway.
I thought it said "Paper-Based Executives". I figured my manager would save a fortune on travel costs if he could fax himself, but would we need an origami specialist to reassemble him on location?
If you're carrying a tank....
Do I need to spell it out?
Ok, Mr. DHS agent, I'll keep it general. Empty tank. Cut off top. Remove concrete from tank. Pack tank with tons of C4, ball bearings, etc, etc.
Tons? That's a mighty big tank. ;)
Heck, if you're worried about scanners, use propane instead of C4. Still a big bada-boom.
Nope. Propane burns well, but it's quite hard to get it to explode. Of course propane tanks, like any pressure vessel, can easily explode if overpressurized (typically by heating the contents), but that requires an external heat source (there's no oxidizer in the tank to support combustion, so the flame will stay outside the tank, and you'll need some sort of burner assembly to direct it onto the tank, rather than flowing outward.
Improvised explosives -- not really hard, but not quite as easy as most people think (largely thanks to Hollywood, where if you shoot a concrete wall with a soft lead bullet, you get an explosion and fireball).
That way, when you get up to the TSA kiosk at security, if your ticket develops the words "I have a bomb" on it, you go into the "I have a bomb" line, and everyone else goes into the "no bombs, it's just a diaper, my boyfriend is an astronaut, long story" line.
Except for how personal oxygen tanks have long been banned on commercial aircraft. And before you ask, not by the TSA, but by the FAA, and predating 9/11.
Some airlines will provide a tank for you, which are certified to be airworthy, and apparently a couple brands of oxygen concentrators are now certified airworthy (But won't provide anything near the kind of kick you'd need).
I tried to look for a cite for you, but after 45 seconds of googleing I hadn't found anything authoritative and my interest waned, so you'll have to look yourself if you don't believe me.
I needed a sig so people would know who I am, but I was too drunk to make something witty, so you get this instead.
Big E-Books are pushing for a ban on paper books on airlines, so they can sell more E-Readers.
[citation needed]
Personally, I heard that the reverse vampires are the ones really in charge.
Someone will try to refill those inkjet cartrdiges in their kitchen to save money!
www.mydealingwithanxiety.com
It's not about the circuit, it's about the sensor itself. They use a printer head to print particles that form nanotubes on the paper.That is actually something to be proud of, if you can achieve that.
I was promised a flying car. Where is my flying car?
The article uses the verb 'can' in a number of places where 'might be possible' is probably more appropriate. They also don't mention the extremely short shelf life of silver nanotubules. Typical univeristy research hype piece.
What's wrong with dear old low-tech versatile dog?
Bingo Dictionary - Pragmatist, n. A myopic idealist.
If you hide the explosives inside the inkjet printer cartridges for the explosives detector printer, the detectors will go off as soon as they're printed and people will just think they're defective. ;)
A urine soaked diaper soon emits large quantities of ammonia when bacteria decompose the urea.
"Prove all things; hold fast that which is good." [KJV: I Thessalonians 5:21]
Then the government will buy the tech, and suddenly each one is 1,200X more expensive. And not because it needs to be MIL-SPEC standard, just because there will be an entire new department to deal with it, maybe even with a Printer Czar for the fun of it. So sick of the government right now. (Yes, I do vote)
Vote monkeys into Congress. They are cheaper and more trustworthy.
I misread the title as 'Expletives sensor' and thought 'wow, are the three seashells next?'
Am I the only one to catch the fact that the sensor is what is paper based, not the explosive.