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Laser Prototype Improves Bomb Detection
angry tapir writes "Scientists at the University of New South Wales (UNSW) in Australia have developed a prototype laser device capable of detecting tiny traces of explosive vapor, an invention that has the potential to put bomb sniffer dogs out of a job. The prototype – a pulsed, quantum laser-based, cavity ring-down spectrometer – is being tested at the US government's Los Alamos National Laboratory in New Mexico."
I clicked on this thinking it said "Laser Prototype Improves Bomb Detonation" and am disappointed..
But why Los Alamos? ...
ohhh...
How many people will set this off because they inadvertently picked up trace elements of an explosive vapor - will car exhaust fumes set this off? In what context do we really care about the existence of parts per billion amounts of explosive vapors? This might be an impressive technical achievement, but the commercial uses of this seem like a solution in search of a problem.
Remember, you can't look dignified when your having fun! Don't take life too seriously, you'll never get out of it alive
As with anything like this, the more sensitive you make it, the more you might have to deal with false positives.
I can only imagine someone going around bumping into people at the airport making sure they all smell like something which will trigger something like this.
It wouldn't be anything more disruptive than suddenly loads of people in the airport get checked for bombs, but I bet you could terribly mess up an airport if you suddenly had a handful of people testing positive.
Of course, to be going around doing this you'd need to smell of bomb residue and probably be seen on surveillance cameras doing it. But for all I know some common household chemicals could cause this now.
Lost at C:>. Found at C.
has the potential to put bomb sniffer dogs out of a job.
Or it could give birth to laser-sighted dogs.
our laser set it off
Sensor technology to replace dogs will never see the light of day because LEA can't train a computer and sensors to produce probable cause on demand...wolf wolf....good boy heres your biscuit..
Ehm... in Australia? If you read the article, it talks of 2 applications, I quote:
Not saying this wouldn't be interesting for the US military, but that was clearly not the target of this research.
I'll believe it when it is well past prototype and challenged by people and not lab results.
But the reality is it WILL NOT alter the delays in traveling. TSA will still do instrusive checks, will still have Xrays etc. You still have to be treated like cattle for this false sense of security.
Seriously, there are wonderful things like vacuum seals.
Why spend money on a laser that's not biodegradable, when instead you can just get Israeli bomb-sniffing mice?
"...pulsed, quantum laser-based, cavity ring-down spectrometer..."
A fucking PQLBCRDS ?
You guys need a better marketing team.
Correction: ... the potential to make the same mistakes as other bomb-sniffer devices.
Does this test for common nitrates? If so, it will produce the same false-positives as current airport scanners.
http://www.apopo.org/home.php?lang=en
Easy to train, easy to maintain, cheap and multifunctional.
The laser technology definitely is cool, but I like the rat solution.
Privacy is terrorism.
...what could possibly go wrong?
Nuffsaid
________
Don't know about his cat, but Schroedinger is definitely dead.
Any number of google-available headlines read "dogs fail bomb-sniffing test." There are plenty of studies which show that bomb, and drug, sniffing dogs "detect" objects their handlers want them to detect.
Almost any residue detector would be better.
https://app.box.com/WitthoftResume Code: https://github.com/cellocgw