Defence Online

New software detects hazardous chemicals

August 24, 2016

Researchers at the University of Edinburgh, working with the Defence Science and Technology Laboratory (Dstl), have pioneered a new chemical substance analysis software technique that could play a significant role in boosting current homeland security measures and illicit substance detection.

Ideally suited for portable hand-held spectroscopy devices, the system provides efficient, real-time analysis and identification of complex chemical mixtures using new Raman spectral decomposition techniques.

This approach, which is technology-agnostic, can handle large spectral databases to accurately pinpoint mixtures of chemical substances. Samples composed of a mixture of different chemicals provide a much greater detection challenge than pure materials, which are typically used in laboratory studies but not representative of real-world samples.

The University of Edinburgh’s commercialisation arm, Edinburgh Research & Innovation (ERI), is now seeking to license this technology to industry partners who wish to deploy it as part of a commercial hardware solution.

Mike Davies, Professor of Signal and Image Processing at the University of Edinburgh’s School of Engineering, said: “Inputting a set of reference spectra and an unknown mixture yields the identity of the mixture elements and also their contribution percentages. It also has the capability of identifying the presence of a spectral component outside the reference library. As such, it is a particularly powerful tool.”

chemical substance analysis software Defence Dstl Homeland MOD security UK University of Edinburgh

Post written by: Julie Shennan

Features Editor of MOD DCB Magazine and MOD DSS Yearbook. Content Marketing Executive at BiP Solutions (Defence Online's sister company). Editor and founder of Artsnfaffs Online Magazine.