Monday, December 23, 2024

Lasers make it easier to find buried landmines

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scientists in The United States has developed technology that can detect landmines at long range and with high accuracy, potentially reducing the risk of mine removal from current and former conflict zones. The technology, known as Laser Multibeam Differential Interferometry Sensor, or Lambdis, works by shining lasers at the ground to reveal suspected threats.

Currently there are over 110 million landmines buried around the world, and in 2023 mines killed or injured 5,700 peopleand 84 percent of the victims were civilians, half of whom were children. According to the United Nations, landmines threaten lives in more than 70 countries.

A mine can be created for as little as $3, but it can cost up to $1,000 to remove. Removing landmines usually involves people finding them using hand-held metal detectors, which is unsafe, time-consuming and almost ineffective when hunting for mines made of plastic.

In response, American researchers developed indirect landmine detection technology that can detect both metal and plastic mines. Lambdis works by sending vibrations to the ground while simultaneously scanning the area with a laser beam. Materials in the ground will vibrate at different frequencies, just like the soil itself, and these differences are picked up by the laser when it is reflected back to the emitter. The Lambdis system then generates an image that visualizes these vibrations and their location in different colors, creating a map of things buried in the ground.

The technology was developed by a team led by Vyacheslav Aranchuk, a laser detection specialist at the University of Mississippi. Importantly, it can detect mines from long distances and can be mounted on a moving vehicle to facilitate scanning of huge areas.

“The number of landmines will continue to enhance as long as conflicts continue. This technology will be useful not only for military purposes during ongoing conflicts, but also for humanitarian activities after their end,” says Aranchuk.

Scientists continue to develop the system. The earlier version of Lambdis emitted 30 laser beams in a line, but the latest version emits beams in a 34 x 23 matrix, which allows the visualization of vibrations over a larger area.

Conventional metal detectors used for mine clearance react to any metal object, so they often incorrectly detect things other than mines. An alternative solution to mine clearance, underground radar, which emits high-frequency electromagnetic waves deep into the earth, has the disadvantage of being easily influenced by soil conditions. In comparison, Lambdis gives fewer false positives.

According to the research team, this technology can be used not only to detect landmines, but also to assess them engineering structures such as bridges for structural integrity or damage. In the future, it can be used to analyze products in the automotive, aerospace and even medical imaging industries. Next, the team plans to evaluate Lambdis’ performance in various soil conditions and when hunting other types of buried targets.

This story originally appeared on WIRED Japan and was translated from Japanese.

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