The development and test phase of the NATO-Russia Stand-off Detection of Explosives (STANDEX) program is complete, NATO officials said.
Four years of cooperation on STANDEX between NATO and Russian scientists has cost $6.4 million in funds from the NATO Science for Peace and Security Program and by national contributions from the United States, British, French, Italian, Russian, and Turkish governments.
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| STANDEX Display Photo: NATO |
The project could help Russia and NATO allies prevent terrorist attacks such as those carried out against public transportation systems in Moscow, London and Madrid.
It is a world first: STANDEX can in real time, remotely detect explosives, officials said in a NATO release. It was tested live in an underground station in a major European city.
The results were conclusive, paving the way for more widespread use of this technology, the statement said.
During the live tests, which took place in June in the underground railway of a European capital, the STANDEX project was able in real time to both pinpoint a suspect and detect explosives concealed on their body, officials said. The alert was activated by an innovative system that also provided analysis of all the data gathered by the different detectors.
STANDEX is unique and innovative, using various technologies, which have been shared and tested for the first time, officials said.
“The first two technologies are based on microwave scanning,” said Dmitry Vakhtin, researcher at the Khlopin Radium Institute, based in St. Petersburg, Russia.
“The system detects explosives concealed on someone,” he said. Anomalies in the molecular composition of the objects or people under surveillance can be seen immediately.
The control system regulates all the sensors and centralizes and combines all the data. If something unusual is detected, it triggers the video surveillance system and enhances the sensitivity of the next set of sensors.
“The spectroscopy technique is very powerful,” said an Italian representative of the Rome-based National Agency for new Technologies, Energy and Sustainable Economic Development (ENEA). “It detects traces of explosives everywhere on people. It is a unique technology that can be operated in mass transit and in eye-safe mode, in full respect of international security laws.”
The next, second phase of the project will concentrate on emergency management or what should be done once a terrorist has been identified. Further tests will be done, this time in Russia.
“So far, the results of the STANDEX project have been convincing,” said Mikhail Korolev, chief engineer of the St Petersburg metro. “We would like to test the technology in our metro network and, on the basis of the results, decide how it can be incorporated in the St. Petersburg metro security system.”
An advantage of STANDEX is flexibility. It can adapt to any environment, be it an underground railway station, an airport or a sports stadium.
“We do not have to completely rethink the system in order to adapt it to meet requirements, and this is the really strong point of the STANDEX technology,” said STANDEX Project Director Pierre Charrue,
Talks with industry are under way with the aim of transferring the technology to industry by the end of October 2015, so that it can be brought to market.
“We will show industry that we have a viable product. Industry can see what NATO has done and what they have to do therefore to commercialize it and make it usable. It has to be affordable,” said Jamie Shea, Deputy Assistant Secretary General of NATO’s Emerging Security Challenges Division.
“STANDEX is our common child,” said Vladimir Dyakov, counsellor at the Russian Mission to NATO. “It is cooperation between different states and also different kinds of entities.” He emphasized this is a first step towards further cooperation. “This is not a final point for STANDEX but a point of reflection: how can we find ways to go forward, to get better use of what we have created together.”
Officially launched in the NATO-Russia Council in February 2010, the STANDEX program was designed and developed jointly by a consortium of Dutch, French, German, Italian and Russian laboratories and companies, pooling their skills and know-how.