For every threat to the homeland, there’s a business that has a technology waiting in the wings to counter a would-be terrorist’s moves.
Many of these are so-called dual use technologies — things that began as a solution in one field, and are now being applied to homeland security. X-rays, for example, were first used a century ago to take pictures inside the human body. Today, the Transportation Security Administration uses low doses to peer underneath clothes to ferret out weapons or bombs.
The market is vast, yet it is a tough one. There are thousands of first responder departments in the United States, but selling new products to them may mean a lot of time on the road. No single entity buys gas masks for every fire station in America. And these municipal, county and state communities aren’t exactly rolling in taxpayer funds right now.
“You still have to sell one courthouse at a time,” says Joe Dyer, who has the task of marketing $160,000 chemical-weapon sniffing robots to municipalities for iRobot Corp.
Despite this, the drive to protect the nation from threats is sparking innovation.
Not surprisingly, many of them are sensor-related. Whether they are designed to search out weapons of mass destruction, homemade bombs or detect clandestine tunnels, discovering threats before they can be employed remains one of the Department of Homeland Security’s greatest challenges.
Here are a few up-and-coming counterterrorism technologies adapted for the homeland security field with the potential to make an impact in the coming years.
Lasers Reveal What’s Inside Suspicious Packages
Suspicious packages are an everyday occurrence that bomb squads must deal with in a timely manner. Vehicle-borne improvised explosive devices — car bombs — are less common, but they can be devastating as the 1995 attack on the Murrah Federal Building in Oklahoma City proved.
A Maryland-based startup wants to use lasers to inspect the outside of almost anything that could contain an explosive, or even a chemical, biological, radiological or nuclear weapon.
The problem would-be terrorists have is that constructing these devices inevitably leaves residues on the outside of their containers.
“Unless you are fastidious and you are in clean room in a [protective] suit and covered from head to toe, you’re going to get residues on something. And if there are residues, you can detect,” said Diane Wong, applications scientist at A3 Technologies, LLC, of Aberdeen, Md.
The company uses a technology called laser-induced breakdown spectroscopy to find the invisible residues.
The operator of the system points a laser at a suspicious package and fires. The pinpoint beam of energy creates a spark of light — or plasma — that is read by optics. Each element on the periodic table has a unique fingerprint. The optics feed the light reading into a computer with software that tells the operator what is on the outside of the package or vehicle.
“Even radiological elements like radium and plutonium will give off a certain wavelength or color,” Wong said.
“It’s very simple technology but there is a lot of information to be gained from this,” she added. The laser can be fired at solids, liquids or gases.
The technology had been around for years, but mostly existed in university laboratories. No one had married the lasers, optics and computer algorithms, explained A3’s Vice President of Operations John Plumer.
That was until the war in Iraq and the roadside bomb threat began a search for sensors that could uncover IEDs. The Joint EID Defeat Organization funded some demonstrations of the technology at the National Training Center in Fort Irwin, Calif., and the Yuma Proving Ground, Ariz.
Now the company wants to market a suite of technologies for first responders. The sensor can come in handheld version, or a portable system in a suitcase-sized container that can be used at standoff distances. A telescope is used to read the light at distances of around 100 feet, although that could be farther away depending on the user’s requirements, he added.
“We are at a point now where we are beta testing products in the field now with first responder groups,” Plumer said.
Bioscavengers to Protect Chem-Bio Teams from Nerve Agents
First responders or soldiers rushing to the scene of a chemical weapon attack may soon have some extra protection against these horrific weapons of mass destruction.
This new layer of defense won’t come in the form of the notoriously hot and uncomfortable protective suits, though. Instead, enzymes found in human blood will serve as a last defense against nerve agents.
Using proteins found in animal and human blood to act as a sponge to sop up toxins was a theory first proposed 25 years ago at the Army Medical Research Institute of Chemical Defense at Aberdeen, Md., said its commander, Col. Harry Slife.
After decades of work on these “bioscavengers,” the Food and Drug Administration is now conducting human safety tests, and Slife predicted they will be fielded within three years.
“Literally on the road to an event, you can be given the injection and be completely protected,” he said at an annual Aberdeen Proving Ground technology showcase.
Researchers at the institute first noticed differences in the way laboratory animals reacted to organophosphorus compounds. Some could withstand the doses better than others.
Why was it harder to inflict this kind of damage to a rat, for example, than it was to a guinea pig, researchers asked.
These compounds are found in pesticides and nerve gases such as VX, soman, and sarin.
Terrorists used the latter in the Matsumoto and Tokyo gas attacks in the mid-1990s. First developed by the Nazis in World War II, they are among the fastest acting and horrific chemical weapons. The agents, which can be absorbed by the skin or inhaled, attack the nervous system causing severe muscle contractions, and respiratory and cardiovascular collapse.
Researchers discovered that the cholinesterases and beta-esterases enzymes could bind with the nerve agents once they have entered the blood stream and render them inactive. However, these proteins are not produced in human blood in high enough quantities to have a prophylactic effect. Researchers have pursued boosting the quantities of the proteins to give first responders or soldiers protection, and that approach has worked so far, said Slife. Since the proteins occur naturally in the blood, the immune system does not reject them.
The results of the FDA Safety tests are promising so far, he said. The only issue has been some minor skin irritation where the bioscavengers were injected.
“We have shown efficacy over and over again,” Slife said.
That has been carried out on laboratory animals. For the safety tests, human subjects can be used, but testing bioscavengers’ effectiveness on anything besides lab animals is impossible. People can’t be subjected to nerve gases in clinical trials. Because of that, the institute is the only laboratory that can receive FDA approved licenses for drugs without human trials, he said.
The bioscavengers will only be given to soldiers or first responders who know that they are about to enter a contaminated area, Slife said. That might be a chemical weapon attack, or a pesticide spill. Organophosphates were first used to kill insects before they were altered to create nerve agents.
The lab is also pursuing a catalytic form of the technology. In this case, the bioscavenger will bind with the nerve agent, then alter and degrade it without losing its own potency. That concept is in the early stages of research and may not be ready until the 2020 time frame, Slife added.
Military Chemical Weapon Robot Adapted for First Responders
Fire departments can now send a robot into buildings suspected of containing chemical weapons and other hazardous materials to determine what is inside before first responders don cumbersome protective suits.
The chemical-biological-radiological-nuclear unmanned ground reconnaissance (CUGR) system was developed by the Army Edgewood Chemical Biological Center, Aberdeen Proving Ground, Md. for units in Iraq and Afghanistan. The program married proven chemical-nuclear material detectors to an iRobot PackBot system.
iRobot is now marketing the robot to first responders, said Joe Dyer, the company’s president for governmental and industrial robotics.
“This new robot payload will expand the capabilities of robots in urban search and rescue, as well as reconnaissance missions, enabling first responders and war fighters to gather and analyze information,” he said.
The robot employs three main sensors.
The first sensor a team will want to employ is the oxygen meter. Knowing how much oxygen is in a confined space is important when considering entering a room with hazardous materials. If the oxygen levels are low, then specialists will not be able to use masks that filter air. The sensor should inform them if they need to switch to a more cumbersome suit with a self-contained breathing apparatus.
A MultiRAE sensor manufactured by RAE Systems of San Jose, Calif., detects explosives, volatile organic compounds, toxic industrial chemicals and the oxygen levels.
Tradeways Ltd. of Annapolis, Md., provides a gamma radiation detector, the UDR 14. An LCD 3.2e, manufactured by Smiths Detection of Alcoa, Tenn., sniffs the air for chemical warfare agents such as blister agents or nerve gases. In the military version, the robot can also gather air samples in tubes that can be taken to a lab and analyzed for biological agents.
Dyer said that option is not being offered on the domestic version. Because it is designed with an open software architecture it is expected to be compatible with such sensors when and if they become available, Dyer said.
The new version is designed to be “plug and play” meaning customers can choose which of the sensors to add to the system. The components can also be mounted on iRobot bomb disposal systems previously sold to fire departments or explosive ordnance disposal teams.
Expense continues to be an issue, especially for cash strapped municipalities, Dyer said. The new robot was first introduced to the market this spring. iRobot has sold three units so far. The average cost is about $167,000 for the system.
Dyer said iRobot has encountered the same difficulties other companies find when selling homeland security technology to first responders. There are thousands of jurisdictions and each makes its own purchasing decisions.
“I am concerned that eight years this side of 9/11, being able to get equipment into the hands of first responders is as difficult as it is.”
National Guard units that specialize in responding to chemical weapon attacks or hazardous material accidents may soon also receive some of the robots, he said.
Low Level Radiation Used to Scan the Insides of Vehicles
Backscatter x-ray technology used to peer underneath the clothing of airline passengers at security checkpoints made headlines recently when Congress stepped in to voice concerns about privacy issues. Using ultra-low doses of radiation to make images reveals too much of a subject’s body, lawmakers said.
But the technology is not new, said one of its pioneers, Steven Smith, president and technical director at Spectrum San Diego Inc. It first made an appearance in the 1990s when the company received Food and Drug Administration approval to manufacture full body scanners, which could pick out guns, explosives or any other hidden objects between the clothes and skin. The FDA has jurisdiction over any device that emits radiation.
Smith at that time had served in two professions when he stumbled upon the idea. He was a former police officer and x-ray technician.
“The real magic behind that technology is not so much that you can make images with x-rays — people have been doing that for 100 years — the real magic is using radiation doses that are so low that they are considered trivial by the radiation protection community,” he said.
For example, the system pulses 5 microrems of radiation to obtain an x-ray image. The average person is exposed to 300 microrems of background radiation every day. And 500 grams every hour during a flight.
“The types of levels we’re talking about are the same kinds of radiation levels we are exposed to now from natural background radiation,” Smith said.
Spectrum sold the full body scanner technology to another company a decade ago. But in the last few years, Smith returned to the ultra-low dose radiation field to address other security concerns.
The first was CastScope, a smaller device designed to peer underneath casts, bandages and prosthetic limbs. The Transportation Security Administration needed something to ensure that passengers weren’t trying to sneak weapons onto airplanes using these covered appendages.
“Right now, if you have an artificial limb and go through an airport, it’s likely you’re going to go through a horrendous procedure,” Smith said. “It’s difficult to get these limbs on and off. You have to take your clothes off to do it.”
The TSA eventually gave Spectrum a contract to deliver 34 CastScopes to airports. Using a retractable arm, the scanner can be pulled over a limb where it takes several 10-inch-by-6-inch images and pieces together a larger picture of what, if anything, is underneath. It is currently undergoing operational tests at 11 airports.
Spectrum hopes to hear this fall on whether the agency will expand the program.
The company also used ultra-low dose radiation to tackle a vexing problem: how to peer inside vehicles. Customs agents want to know if cars are being used to smuggle people or contraband. Security personnel guarding buildings or other facilities need to protect against car bombs.
“If asked two years ago if this was going to work or not, I would only given it a 50 percent chance,” Smith said. Cars contain thick steel. Using normal low dose x-rays returned a muddled image. It would be nearly impossible to separate organic material from the metal inside the vehicle. If using too low of an energy level, the x-rays would not be able to penetrate the vehicle’s body at all.
The breakthrough was finding just the right amount of energy to pulse through a vehicle. Once that was discovered, the company manufactured two CarScan prototypes. The portals can produce an image of a car’s inner-workings while moving through at 10 miles per hour. One is being tested at an East Coast facility with an eye toward putting it in the field, possibly outside a car ferry port. The other will be sent to a military base for testing. Smith declined to reveal the potential customers’ names or locations.
Experimental Tunnel Detector to Hunt for Subterranean PassagesIllegal tunnels pose a serious problem for federal agents who monitor the border. They begin and end just about anywhere and can be used to transport people, drugs and weapons into the United States.
As the Department of Homeland Security has beefed up the southern border with more “boots on the ground,” better fencing and technology such as unmanned aerial vehicles, smugglers have began digging more tunnels to escape detection.
Many of these tunnels are sophisticated works with ventilation systems, water pumps and strong wooden beams to reinforce the ceilings. Millions of dollars worth of drugs can be transported underground in one night, making them good investments for drug cartels.
So far, most of these underground passages have been found through informants’ tips or by happenstance. Sensors are usually brought in after the fact in order to confirm precise locations.
“All of them have been found by good law enforcement work or by chance,” said Ed Turner, a project manager with the Department of Homeland Security’s science and technology directorate. In one case, a Border Patrol water truck drove over a tunnel near Yuma, Ariz., and collapsed the structure.
The directorate, meanwhile, has been searching for a way to be more proactive in this subterranean cat-and-mouse game.
Lockheed Martin’s advanced technology laboratory is working on a ground penetrating radar system for the Homeland Security Advanced Research Projects Agency’s tunnel detection program that will allow agents to randomly drive along the border and find cavities below the surface.
The technology is intended to help agents locate and plug tunnels almost as fast as criminals can dig them, a directorate press release said.
A high resolution frequency agile radar (HRFAR) prototype has been assembled and tested. “The lab model is showing a lot of promise,” said Steve O’Neill, senior manager of communications and public affairs for the lab. The system was tested this past spring in a large box filled with sand, rocks and pipes acting as tunnels in order to simulate the southwest border.
“The HRFAR uses lower frequencies to avoid a scattered image and to penetrate the ground deeper,” said Marc Olivieri, Lockheed Martin’s manager for the HRFAR program. Images are then sent to a monitor and put together to construct a multi-colored picture of the ground below. The depth the radar can penetrate and the image quality are dependent on the soil type and moisture content.
The next phase will be to build a full system that will fit in the back of a truck. Border Patrol agents would ideally be able to drive the radar over areas where they think a tunnel may be located.
“If the full version of the HRFAR is successful, then hopefully we will build a series of them,” Olivieri said. Lockheed Martin began developing this radar system in early 2008 and he estimated it will be finished in 2010.