Electromagnetics and
Radio Frequency Technology & Engineering
Electromagnetics
PNNL's applied physics group offers a broad range of expertise in noninvasive measurement technologies that assist government industrial clients in solving difficult sensing, monitoring and processing problems. This group develops measurement systems using its knowledge of advanced measurement technologies for the characterization of complex materials and structures. Its capabilities in acoustics and ultrasound, optics, radar and millimeter-wave imaging, electromagnetics and technological assessment are being applied to the development of cutting-edge solutions. Researchers also have leveraged these capabilities to develop novel acoustic processing techniques in the high-energy, non-linear acoustic regime. This allows PNNL to address a wide variety of practical problems — including nuclear engineering, advanced sensing and detection, and manufacturing processes. Researchers from the applied physics group, drawing upon knowledge gained through more than 35 years of government- and industry-sponsored research activities, provide a continuum of expertise from basic science theory through hardware development.
Radio Frequency Technology and Engineering
Radio frequency tags are small, inexpensive tags that can be used to identify, inventory and track assets. The tags range in size from a grain of rice to a credit card and can be encoded with detailed information.
Throughout the 1990s, PNNL engineers made significant advances in radio frequency tag technology, creating smaller, less expensive tags that have up to 10 times the read range of previous tags, and that can be read at relatively high rates. The tags can be tailored to monitor for conditions such as temperature, strain and force. As a result, groups of items may be inventoried in minutes instead of days, and the exact location of a specific item can be determined at any time. In addition, full life-cycle information — such as serial number, warranty information, purchase date, return for repair date and other information — can be written into the tagged items as they are read at different points in the supply chain.
PNNL Development: Holograph Imaging
Imagine a system the passengers walk through at an airport that can detect hidden, plastic and metal weapons under clothing. The millimeter-wave Holographic Imaging System is an innovative technology originally designed for the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) to detect both metallic and nonmetallic items concealed under clothing, such as plastic or ceramic handguns and knives, as well as plastic and liquid explosives.
The system uses millimeter waves — that can penetrate clothing but are harmless to people — and centimeter waves that illuminate tissue matter. Those signals penetrate clothing and reflect off the body — or items concealed on the body. An array collects those reflected signals, and a computer algorithm program reconstructs the data into images of the person. PNNL has had a holography program in place for nearly 30 years and originally developed nondestructive evaluation technologies for nuclear reactors. In the mid-1980s, the FAA became interested in this technology for scanning people passing through airports.
PNNL Development: Munitions Readiness in Iraq
Making sure every missile is properly functioning is imperative for our U.S. troops. That's why PNNL researchers are working with clients to develop the Health Monitor System (HMS) for these high value assets. HMS monitors critical parameters that are used to assess and report missile's readiness condition, such as shock, temperature, humidity, vibration, and magnetic fields. The technology is a low-cost, self-powered autonomous system capable of measuring, recording and displaying key sensor parameters in the field. HMS enables the service member to ascertain if a missile has been subjected to extreme environmental exposure or misuse that may effect its readiness. Using the system service members are able to locally "read" asset readiness status by pressing a button on the HMS unit. Alternately, the service member may interrogate the HMS over a radio frequency link using a personal digital assistant. The HMS will indicate the status in an easily discernable, "go/no-go" manner.
HMS can also be applied to monitor the "health" of aging infrastructures and global tracking, misuse and mishandling of other strategic assets.