NASA Weapons Detection Discovery

Brett Adcock shares how he discovered NASA's weapons detection technology through reading research papers and cold calling JPL.

"I came across a research paper from NASA's Jet Propulsion Lab where they were doing work trying to detect bomb vests and weapons underneath garments and clothes for Afghanistan and Iraq. They developed some interesting weapons imaging technology.

I flew to JPL in Pasadena after cold calling the guy who ran it. I said 'Hey, I need to learn more about this, I read your paper, can we have a conversation?' Most people will get on the phone with you if you're passionate about work they did years ago that they're no longer doing.

When I got there, we were talking and chatting and I didn't even think to ask to see the machine. At the end of the conversation he asked 'You want to come see it?' We walked down 4 flights of stairs to the basement. He takes the cover off - it's dusty with a huge compact computer at the bottom with old electronics and systems.

He turns it on and demos it for me. We had a mannequin with a gun underneath his shirt. It was unbelievable - it was like a camera picture of the gun, but with radio frequency we also got a 3D reconstruction. They developed high frequency radar, similar to WiFi or phone signals but souped up to a much higher frequency level. They were able to penetrate clothing and start imaging what's happening inside bags and clothing. You can do it from 50 meters away and take camera frame rate images. It can detect any material - plastic, metal, anything."