One of the greatest threats to our nation is the possibility of terrorists detonating a nuclear device in a city or port. While obtaining such a
device or the materials with which to make one is difficult, the task of smuggling such into the country seems much less so. Scientists on LANL's
Background Radiography project have developed ways of detecting dense, high atomic-number materials (such as uranium or plutonium) in vehicles or cargo containers, using only the natural, ever-present shower of
cosmic-ray muons. These charged particles pass through large quantities of lead or rock, yet are easily detected. Muons are deflected more by dense, high atomic-number materials than by more common materials such as iron or water, so by measuring their position before and after passing through a cargo container, the presence of such materials can be inferred from the
scattering data in roughly a minute. By doing this with background radiation, the expense, potential health risk, and regulatory burden of
generating radiation is avoided.
In this talk, we will discuss how we take the large amount of raw data and use geometry, analysis, and learning methods to come to a decision as to whether threatening material is present.
Presentation (PDF File)
Video of Talk (RealPlayer File)
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