New development in portable sensor allows low-cost components to be left behind (disposable)

Abstract

Tactical deployment of out-of-doors intrusion detection system sensors can be hazardous to law-enforcement personnel. There is a growing demand for deployment to be done secretly. Personnel are obliged to minimize their exposure to hazards and maximize mission effectiveness. Sensor hardware must be exceptionally low-cost in order to be "left behind", or considered disposable. Recent developments in noncoherent synergistic radar (NCSR) allow the RF transmitter (sensor) and RF receiver (processing engine) to be deployed wirelessly up to three kilometers away from each other. A 'leaky cable' sensor (ported coax) provides a two-meter wide contour of detection, typically fifty to two hundred meters in length. A miniature antenna provides a two-meter, spherical point-of-detection. For the purpose of this paper, "sensing elements" include; nonmetallic baseball-sized artificial stones and tree branches, RF miniature antenna, battery circuit and logic. All of which priced to be "left behind". The processing engine includes a portable receiver connected to a tripod-mounted directional antenna, located in a safe-zone far away from its related sensing elements. The receiver multiplexes, facilitating the processing of up to sixteen different frequency-coded transmitters (artificial stones). An alarm, resulting from an intrusion into any one of the sixteen spherical point zones is reported to wireless hand-held equipment. Results of a series of tactical field trials are published. Sensors (artificial stone) were secretly deposited by hand, dropped from aircraft or simply distributed using military artillery.