Book chapter
Real-Time Radionuclide Identification and Mapping Capabilities of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s Airborne Spectral Photometric Environmental Collection Technology
Nuclear Terrorism and National Preparedness, pp.105-116
NATO Science for Peace and Security Series B: Physics and Biophysics, Springer Netherlands
2015
DOI: 10.1007/978-94-017-9891-4_10
Abstract
The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, CBRN Consequence Management Advisory Team fields a fixed-wing aircraft known as the Airborne Spectral Photometric Environmental Collection Technology (ASPECT). ASPECT is a 24/7/365 response-ready asset that can be airborne within an hour and collecting chemical, radiological and photographic data anywhere in the continental United States within 9 hours of notification from its home base near Dallas, TX. A primary goal of the program is to provide actionable intelligence to decision makers within minutes of data collection via the aircraft satellite communication system while the aircraft is still flying. To achieve this goal, a new method to process airborne gamma spectroscopy data was investigated that effectively eliminates the need for traditional airborne calibration methods currently used in airborne systems (e.g., stripping coefficients, test lines, radon correction, altitude, and background corrections). The new algorithm provides nuclide identification near real-time and creates an radionuclide-specific map without user-interface input.
This algorithm uses a novel combination of signal processing and multivariate pattern recognition to implement an automated classifier for the detection of radionuclides from gamma-ray spectra. The algorithm was applied to detect Cs-137 over fallout from nuclear weapon tests conducted in the 1960s. The aerial survey data were collected in 2010, over 50 years post-detonation. The combination of infinite-impulse response (IIR) filtering with piecewise linear discriminant analysis (PLDA) classification was found to yield the most sensitive detection method.
Overall, this method has demonstrated very promising results and appears to be generalizable to other aircraft configurations provided they fly within an acceptable altitude range and are equipped with sodium iodide crystals.
Details
- Title: Subtitle
- Real-Time Radionuclide Identification and Mapping Capabilities of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s Airborne Spectral Photometric Environmental Collection Technology
- Creators
- John Cardarelli - CBRN Consequence Management Advisory Division, Environmental Protection Agency, Erlanger, USAMark Thomas - CBRN Consequence Management Advisory Division, Environmental Protection Agency, Kansas City, USATimothy Curry - CBRN Consequence Management Advisory Division, Environmental Protection Agency, Kansas City, USARobert Kroutil - Kalman and Company, Inc., Virginia Beach, USAJeff Stapleton - Kalman and Company, Inc., Virginia Beach, USADavid Miller - Kalman and Company, Inc., Virginia Beach, USAGary Small - Department of Chemistry & Optical Science and Technology Center, University of Iowa, Iowa City, USABrian Dess - Department of Chemistry & Optical Science and Technology Center, University of Iowa, Iowa City, USA
- Resource Type
- Book chapter
- Publication Details
- Nuclear Terrorism and National Preparedness, pp.105-116
- Publisher
- Springer Netherlands; Dordrecht
- Series
- NATO Science for Peace and Security Series B: Physics and Biophysics
- DOI
- 10.1007/978-94-017-9891-4_10
- eISSN
- 1874-6535
- ISSN
- 1874-6500
- Language
- English
- Date published
- 2015
- Academic Unit
- Chemistry
- Record Identifier
- 9984083222902771
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