Papers by Denis Michael Reidy
Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact
To answer one of the most frequently asked questions in humanitarian demining, "Which is the... more To answer one of the most frequently asked questions in humanitarian demining, "Which is the best detector for my country to use?,” the International Pilot Project for Technology Cooperation (IPPTC) sought to demonstrate the mine detection capabilities of commercial-off-the-shelf (COTS) metal detectors. Based on controlled laboratory work to determine key detector parameters, the IPPTC also used actual in-country field-testing to acquire real world data on these detectors. These field tests were performed in mine-afflicted areas of Croatia and Cambodia. Later, an additional follow-on field test was performed in Nicaragua drew upon the IPPTC results and used some of the same detectors. Taking the detectors in-country for testing is one way to provide useful information about the effects on detection of indigenous soil conditions. It also creates significant issues in trying to perform reliably repeatable tests while exposed to the widely variable and often rigorous conditions under deminers must work. This presentation describes the standard test procedures that we have followed and the often ad hoc additions that were made to account for local conditions and needs in these countries. The ability to plan and conduct field efforts flexibly allows such testing to be performed even in uncontrolled environments. The results of the testing itself will also be presented and analyzed for the relative effects of local soil conditions on rates of detection.
Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact
Proceedings of SPIE, Sep 21, 2004
The assumption is that removal of elements of clutter from the frequency stepped ground penetrati... more The assumption is that removal of elements of clutter from the frequency stepped ground penetration radar (GPR) signal data will improve the performance of any detection algorithms. Clutter comes in the form of internal system interference, cross-coupling signals between antennas, and soil artifacts (soil layers, rocks, non-homogeneous material, grass, etc.). The assumption is that the frequency stepped radar has a number of steps that cover a fixed bandwidth, and that the radar is phase coherent from step to step and over time. Processing consists of transforming the signal data into the spatial-frequency dimension and applying a set of filters, and then transforming into the range (bandwidth compression) dimension. The developed filters remove spectral components that are associated with signal returns from clutter elements. Examples using data from the US Army AN/PSS-14 mine detection system operating over inert mines are presented.
Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact
Proceedings of SPIE, Sep 21, 2004
ABSTRACT Newer detectors are growing in capability to discriminate those signals measured over mi... more ABSTRACT Newer detectors are growing in capability to discriminate those signals measured over mines from those signals that can be causally related to local variations in the soil. Monitoring and measuring the key properties governing these local variations are being looked at increasingly as a means to predict performance measures for given detectors, as well as to counter the occurrence of such signals in an effort to minimize false alarms. Currently, an ongoing government research project working to develop enhancements to the Handheld Standoff Mine Detection System (HSTAMIDS) technology resulted in a series of data collections acquired in four different types of soil environments: 1) temperate/loamy, 2) temperate/grassy/gravel, 3) arid/gravel/sand, and 4) tropical/laterite. At each of these locations, data was collected using the HSTAMIDS technology to provide a range of environmental conditions against which the performance of this handheld detector could be assessed. This project is obtaining similar electrical and magnetic measurements in these areas to use these measurements to monitor any changes in detection performance that might be introduced due to local soil variations, as well as to provide a preliminary estimate of the robustness of future HSTAMIDS detection enhancements across a variety of environments.
Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact
Proceedings of SPIE, Sep 21, 2004
A government-funded effort was initiated to further develop algorithms based on the technology us... more A government-funded effort was initiated to further develop algorithms based on the technology used in the U.S. Army"s latest handheld standoff mine detection system (HSTAMIDS). To this end, a complete multisensor (EM/GPR) baseline signature data set was acquired in the spring of 2003 over targets of interest for landmine detection. These were provided at a government-run test site in the eastern U.S. where hundreds of buried inert mines and discrete clutter objects are available for such signature measurements. Bringing the HSTAMIDS detector technology to this site, in conjunction with a tethered data acquisition hardware and platforms, resulted in a complete baseline multisensor signature data collection. Due to the multisensor nature of the HSTAMIDS technology, the properties of this data collection include total and real-time collocation of electromagnetic and radar sensors. Processed examples of signatures of objects of interest from this baseline signature data set are presented here, along with a summary of the use to which this data set has been put so far. The means for future requests for access to the baseline data set by individual researchers for further algorithm work are also detailed.
Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact
Proceedings of SPIE, Jul 22, 1997
ABSTRACT This paper explores the application of standoff vehicular mounted mine detection technol... more ABSTRACT This paper explores the application of standoff vehicular mounted mine detection technologies. These technologies could support a fieldable standoff mine detection system for the digitized battlefield.In the rapidly evolving countermine field, the standoff detection of mines has become a goal for Government, industrial research and development communities. Standoff mine detection is demanded by worldwide armed forces and extolled by industry. Obvious benefits, such as operator safety, increased reaction time, and enhanced vehicle maneuverability sustain standoff developments. In order to determine those inclusive standoff detection requisites the authors discuss overall worldwide vehicular mounted mine detection requirements. The authors provide a tabulated assessment of these worldwide requirements. Consideration is made of both vertical and horizontal sensors which constitute the industrial community's technical developments. Incorporation of common digitized positioning systems and multiply-correlated technologies, will be described. The resultant digitization of the acquired horizontal and vertical standoff data and detection results are considered with respect to a standard Geographic Information System Universal Transverse Mercator databases. These data and results can be applied to later relocation and remediation activities. Finally requirements and technologies are crosswalked to determine the best technology application at the least operational risk. Concluding remarks provide suggestions for the US Army and industry.© (1997) COPYRIGHT SPIE--The International Society for Optical Engineering. Downloading of the abstract is permitted for personal use only.
Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact
The Joint UXO Coordination Office (JUXOCO) at Ft. Belvoir, VA is sponsoring a series of experimen... more The Joint UXO Coordination Office (JUXOCO) at Ft. Belvoir, VA is sponsoring a series of experiments designed to establish a performance baseline for a variety of sensors. The purpose of these experiments is to determine if advanced algorithms are useful for detecting low-metallic content mines ...
Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact
Proceedings of SPIE, Oct 1, 1990
ABSTRACT This paper demonstrates the advantages of applying raultisensor data fusion techniques f... more ABSTRACT This paper demonstrates the advantages of applying raultisensor data fusion techniques for the mine detection and classification problem. It has long been recognized that no single sensor technique is adequate for the detection and classification of the wide spectrum of anti-personnel, anti-vehicle and anti-tank mines currently deployed under an even wider spectrum of battle and geological conditions. The experimental results have indicated that mine detection and classification performance can be greatly enhanced by using an array of complementary sensors whose outputs are fused to extract information not otherwise available from a single sensor.
Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact
Proceedings of SPIE, Apr 3, 2008
ABSTRACT Object depth is a simple characteristic that can indicate an object's type. Popu... more ABSTRACT Object depth is a simple characteristic that can indicate an object's type. Popular instruments like radar, metal detectors, and magnetometers are often used to detect the presence of a subsurface object. The next question is often, "How deep is it?" Determining the answer, however, is not as straight forward as might be expected. This paper explores the determination of depth using metal detectors. More specifically, it looks at a popular metal detector (the Geonics EM61) and makes use of its vertically separated coils to generate a depth estimate. Estimated depths are shown for UXO and small surface clutter from flush buried down to 48". Ultimately a statistical depth resolution is determined. An alternative approach is then considered that casts the depth determination problem as one of classification. Only two classes are considered important "deep" and "shallow". Results are shown that illustrate the utility of the classifier approach. The traditional estimator can provide a depth estimate of the object, but the classifier approach can distinguish between small shallow, large deep, and large shallow object classes.
Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact
Proceedings of SPIE, Jun 17, 1996
ABSTRACT The Focused Array Radar (FAR) is a unique time-domain radar system which uses adjustable... more ABSTRACT The Focused Array Radar (FAR) is a unique time-domain radar system which uses adjustable time delayed signals in a wide multi-element array which focuses transmitted and received signals to detect targets in lossy soil. By making use of specially-designed folded rhombus antenna elements--which are both ultra-wideband and more omnidirectional in the forward direction than a comparable dipole--the FAR optimizes the trade-off between target resolution and penetration depth. These projectory antenna elements, patented by GEO-CENTERS, INC., faithfully radiate sub- nanosecond pulses with frequency response varying from about 700 MHz to 1.3 GHz, so targets in wet soils within 60 cm of the surface and as small as 8 cm can be resolved. The array signals are focused by establishing the time delay from each element to each sample point in the soil medium, taking into consideration the differing propagation speed in air and various soils, as well as ray path refraction at the air/ground interface. These delays are applied in roughly ten picosecond intervals to the transmitted signal and used to time gate the received signal. By using time delays for a focused wideband pulse, the phases of each frequency component of the radar signal are in effect properly specified for constructive interference. Also, as a result of the time-gating, the large ground surface reflection signal is avoided.
Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact
IEEE Transactions on Geoscience and Remote Sensing, Apr 1, 2002
Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact
Proceedings of SPIE, Aug 22, 2000
EMI, or metal detector, sensors are used extensively to detect landmines. There is often a signif... more EMI, or metal detector, sensors are used extensively to detect landmines. There is often a significant amount of metallic clutter present in the environment, thus EMI sensors that utilize traditional detection algorithms based solely on metal content suffer from large false alarm rates. The focus of this paper is on performance improvements that have been obtained using Bayesian-based statistical algorithms
Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact
This paper explores the application of standoff vehicular mounted mine detection technologies. Th... more This paper explores the application of standoff vehicular mounted mine detection technologies. These technologies could support a fieldable standoff mine detection system for the digitized battlefield.In the rapidly evolving countermine field, the standoff detection of mines has become a goal for Government, industrial research and development communities. Standoff mine detection is demanded by worldwide armed forces and extolled by industry. Obvious benefits, such as operator safety, increased reaction time, and enhanced vehicle maneuverability sustain standoff developments. In order to determine those inclusive standoff detection requisites the authors discuss overall worldwide vehicular mounted mine detection requirements. The authors provide a tabulated assessment of these worldwide requirements. Consideration is made of both vertical and horizontal sensors which constitute the industrial community's technical developments. Incorporation of common digitized positioning systems and multiply-correlated technologies, will be described. The resultant digitization of the acquired horizontal and vertical standoff data and detection results are considered with respect to a standard Geographic Information System Universal Transverse Mercator databases. These data and results can be applied to later relocation and remediation activities. Finally requirements and technologies are crosswalked to determine the best technology application at the least operational risk. Concluding remarks provide suggestions for the US Army and industry. Bibtex entry for this abstract Preferred format for this abstract (see Preferences) Find Similar Abstracts: Use: Authors Title Abstract Text Return: Query Results Return items starting with number Query Form Database: Astronomy Physics arXiv e-prints
Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact
Symposium on the Application of Geophysics to Engineering and Environmental Problems 2000, 2000
Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact
Radar Sensor Technology, 1996
ABSTRACT The Focused Array Radar (FAR) is a unique time-domain radar system which uses adjustable... more ABSTRACT The Focused Array Radar (FAR) is a unique time-domain radar system which uses adjustable time delayed signals in a wide multi-element array which focuses transmitted and received signals to detect targets in lossy soil. By making use of specially-designed folded rhombus antenna elements--which are both ultra-wideband and more omnidirectional in the forward direction than a comparable dipole--the FAR optimizes the trade-off between target resolution and penetration depth. These projectory antenna elements, patented by GEO-CENTERS, INC., faithfully radiate sub- nanosecond pulses with frequency response varying from about 700 MHz to 1.3 GHz, so targets in wet soils within 60 cm of the surface and as small as 8 cm can be resolved. The array signals are focused by establishing the time delay from each element to each sample point in the soil medium, taking into consideration the differing propagation speed in air and various soils, as well as ray path refraction at the air/ground interface. These delays are applied in roughly ten picosecond intervals to the transmitted signal and used to time gate the received signal. By using time delays for a focused wideband pulse, the phases of each frequency component of the radar signal are in effect properly specified for constructive interference. Also, as a result of the time-gating, the large ground surface reflection signal is avoided.
Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact
Symposium on the Application of Geophysics to Engineering and Environmental Problems 2002, 2002
Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact
Detection and Remediation Technologies for Mines and Minelike Targets IX, 2004
The assumption is that removal of elements of clutter from the frequency stepped ground penetrati... more The assumption is that removal of elements of clutter from the frequency stepped ground penetration radar (GPR) signal data will improve the performance of any detection algorithms. Clutter comes in the form of internal system interference, cross-coupling signals between antennas, and soil artifacts (soil layers, rocks, non-homogeneous material, grass, etc.). The assumption is that the frequency stepped radar has a number of steps that cover a fixed bandwidth, and that the radar is phase coherent from step to step and over time. Processing consists of transforming the signal data into the spatial-frequency dimension and applying a set of filters, and then transforming into the range (bandwidth compression) dimension. The developed filters remove spectral components that are associated with signal returns from clutter elements. Examples using data from the US Army AN/PSS-14 mine detection system operating over inert mines are presented.
Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact
Detection and Remediation Technologies for Mines and Minelike Targets IX, 2004
ABSTRACT Newer detectors are growing in capability to discriminate those signals measured over mi... more ABSTRACT Newer detectors are growing in capability to discriminate those signals measured over mines from those signals that can be causally related to local variations in the soil. Monitoring and measuring the key properties governing these local variations are being looked at increasingly as a means to predict performance measures for given detectors, as well as to counter the occurrence of such signals in an effort to minimize false alarms. Currently, an ongoing government research project working to develop enhancements to the Handheld Standoff Mine Detection System (HSTAMIDS) technology resulted in a series of data collections acquired in four different types of soil environments: 1) temperate/loamy, 2) temperate/grassy/gravel, 3) arid/gravel/sand, and 4) tropical/laterite. At each of these locations, data was collected using the HSTAMIDS technology to provide a range of environmental conditions against which the performance of this handheld detector could be assessed. This project is obtaining similar electrical and magnetic measurements in these areas to use these measurements to monitor any changes in detection performance that might be introduced due to local soil variations, as well as to provide a preliminary estimate of the robustness of future HSTAMIDS detection enhancements across a variety of environments.
Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact
Detection and Remediation Technologies for Mines and Minelike Targets IX, 2004
A government-funded effort was initiated to further develop algorithms based on the technology us... more A government-funded effort was initiated to further develop algorithms based on the technology used in the U.S. Army"s latest handheld standoff mine detection system (HSTAMIDS). To this end, a complete multisensor (EM/GPR) baseline signature data set was acquired in the spring of 2003 over targets of interest for landmine detection. These were provided at a government-run test site in the eastern U.S. where hundreds of buried inert mines and discrete clutter objects are available for such signature measurements. Bringing the HSTAMIDS detector technology to this site, in conjunction with a tethered data acquisition hardware and platforms, resulted in a complete baseline multisensor signature data collection. Due to the multisensor nature of the HSTAMIDS technology, the properties of this data collection include total and real-time collocation of electromagnetic and radar sensors. Processed examples of signatures of objects of interest from this baseline signature data set are presented here, along with a summary of the use to which this data set has been put so far. The means for future requests for access to the baseline data set by individual researchers for further algorithm work are also detailed.
Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact
Detection and Sensing of Mines, Explosive Objects, and Obscured Targets XIII, 2008
Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact
Uploads
Papers by Denis Michael Reidy