Cell Phones As a Dirty Bomb Detection Network 103
First time accepted submitter iinventstuff writes "The Idaho National Laboratory has built a dirty bomb detection network out of cell phones. Camera phones operate by detecting photons and storing them as a picture. The INL discovered that high energy photons from radiological sources distort the image in ways detectable through image processing. KSL TV reports that the INL's mobile app detects radiation sources and then reports positive 'hits' to a central server. Terrorists deploying a dirty bomb will inevitably pass by people carrying cell phones. By crowdsourcing cell phones, the INL has created a potentially very large, inexpensive, and randomly mobile radiation detection grid."
Re:A Slashdot user predicted this way ahead of tim (Score:4, Informative)
Too late: http://gammapix.com/corporate/about [gammapix.com] "The patent-protected GammaPix (TM) technology (U.S. Patent Nos. 7,391,028 and 7,737,410 plus foreign filings) has been under development since 2002 with over $2.5 million in government support." http://patft1.uspto.gov/netacgi/nph-Parser?patentnumber=7391028 [uspto.gov] and patft1.uspto.gov/netacgi/nph-Parser?patentnumber=7737410 were from applications filed on Feb. 28, 2005.
Re:lead lining (Score:4, Informative)
lead doe not magically stop 100% of gamma rays from a source.. Consider 1.1 MeV gamma rays from cobalt 60, a centimeter of lead will cut the amount of gamma rays only to half, still detectable.