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Laser Prototype Improves Bomb Detection

Posted by samzenpus on from the no-more-boom dept.

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."

15 of 59 comments (clear)

  1. I need glasses... by Hagaric · · Score: 4, Funny

    I clicked on this thinking it said "Laser Prototype Improves Bomb Detonation" and am disappointed..

    1. Re:I need glasses... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Yeah, now legitimate, law-abiding gun owners can be arrested and labeled as terrorists for attempting to board an airplane after going to the gun range several days earlier.

    2. Re:I need glasses... by Jeremiah+Cornelius · · Score: 2

      Wooden matches.

      I still use them to light-up the old meerschaum.

      "Up against the wall, pipe-smoker!"

      --
      "Flyin' in just a sweet place,
      Never been known to fail..."
    3. Re:I need glasses... by Obfuscant · · Score: 2

      Why don't they make investment into areas that would result in well-being and abundances - eliminating the threat of anyone resorting to use of explosives?

      Because well-being and abundances have nothing to do with people who want to use explosives to blow things up? I.e., you won't eliminate the threat.

    4. Re:I need glasses... by hamburger+lady · · Score: 2

      oh noes! your backpack was swabbed? the humanity!

      --

      ---
      Is this the MPAA? Is this the RIAA? Is this the DMCA? I thought it was the USA!
    5. Re:I need glasses... by BlueStrat · · Score: 2

      Yeah, now legitimate, law-abiding gun owners can be arrested and labeled as terrorists for attempting to board an airplane after going to the gun range several days earlier.

      Not just gun owners.

      Guitar players, too.

      Many of the most popular guitar picks, like the Fender Heavy picks I use, are celluloid. Which when used wear down, producing nitrocellulose dust.

      That's nitrocellulose. Also known as gun-cotton which, when soaked with nitroglycerin and formed into sticks, makes dynamite.

      Just try putting a flame to a celluloid pick sometime. Be prepared with a large ashtray or something fireproof to drop it into immediately, as it will flare into flame quite energetically with a small roar.

      One could theoretically take a bag of picks into the aircrafts' lavatory, use an emery-board, fingernail file, or something similar to grind/abrade the picks into a rough powder, place it into an improvised small container, and have yourself an improvised explosive device.

      And with that, I'm probably on yet another government list.

      Strat

      --
      Progressivism (aka US 'Liberalism'): Ideas so good they need a police/surveillance-state to enforce.
    6. Re:I need glasses... by davydagger · · Score: 2

      you'd think, but apparently it doesn't work like that.

      GSR is apparently different than bombs resisude wise. I did a shooting course once so intense I was sneezing GSR from my boogers for weeks. (shot 10,000 rounds in a week, various guns), immediately after I went home via airplane, and the dogs walked right past me.

      people who work in demolition, do get stopped regularlly.

  2. Anything that sensitive could cause problems by gstoddart · · Score: 4, Interesting

    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.
    1. Re:Anything that sensitive could cause problems by Sarten-X · · Score: 5, Interesting

      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.

      That doesn't matter. What matters is that you can deposit a chemical on a large number of others who have a high probability of going quickly to an airport security check. You never need to go near the sensors yourself.

      One easy exploit is to rig a aerosol dispersal into a car's exhaust, then drive through a departures drop-off area a few times. Alternatively, contaminate the air around a rental car return. If the airport is one of those with significant public areas outside the secure area, a purse with an occasionally-puffing atomizer will be practically unnoticeable. Better yet, disguise the purse-riding atomizer as a wallet, and confess to coming to the airport in the middle of a pickpocketing spree. Bonus points if the pickpocketing is also staged for the benefit of cameras.

      Taking another easy route, we could assume that contact's necessary to spread the scent to a person. That's also easy enough to accomplish. How many countertops, queue barrier posts, and restroom faucets are in an airport? With a small team of pre-contaminated guests with many complaints and small bladders, a barely-noticeable compound can be spread to hundreds of unsuspecting participants easily.

      And with that, I'm probably now on yet another list...

      --
      You do not have a moral or legal right to do absolutely anything you want.
    2. Re:Anything that sensitive could cause problems by Charliemopps · · Score: 2

      You could do that now. Order some uranium off of ebay, smack it with a hammer to turn it into dusts, sprinkle on the mat at the departures section so every tracks it all over the airport and watch the Chaos. Frankly, I'm surprised it hasn't already happened.

    3. Re:Anything that sensitive could cause problems by Sarten-X · · Score: 4, Insightful

      It hasn't happened because it doesn't need to yet. I hate being one of those guys who says the terrorists have already won, but the terrorists have already won. An aspect of American daily life is interrupted by a constant reminder of how we pissed off somebody else. Once the privacy advocates fight enough, and enough time has passed to calm the politicians, the ridiculous security theater will relax... then there will be another incident to remind us that we will never be safe, and never really were.

      The only way to return to normal convenient-yet-insecure life is to let attacks happen with no reaction, but that goes against human instinct.

      --
      You do not have a moral or legal right to do absolutely anything you want.
  3. We detected the bomb, but... by raftpeople · · Score: 2

    our laser set it off

  4. bomb-sniffing mice by RaymondRuptime · · Score: 2

    Why spend money on a laser that's not biodegradable, when instead you can just get Israeli bomb-sniffing mice?

  5. Really? by nospam007 · · Score: 3, Insightful

    "...pulsed, quantum laser-based, cavity ring-down spectrometer..."

    A fucking PQLBCRDS ?

    You guys need a better marketing team.

  6. Use a rat... by Fuzzums · · Score: 2

    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.