NASA readies iPhones as Possible Anti-terrorist Tool
11/29/2009 11:26:00 PM - 0 comments
Ever thought of converting your iPhone into a bomb detector? Well, believe it or not; scientists at NASA are hopeful that a chemical sensor for smartphones (like iPhone) might some day form the backbone of sophisticated chemical detection network. Reports are rife that NASA is seriously working on turning iPhone into chemical bomb detector. According to a latest report filed by LiveScience, a chemical sensor (the size of a postage stamp) can be plugged into an iPhone to convert the smartphone into a chemical detector.However, this operation requires to jailbreak iphone and considering Apple’s restrictions to tamper with the iPhone architecture, NASA researchers and developers are not able to hack the iPhone's architecture in the way that would benefit further research.
Why is iPhone the best bet for NASA’s chemical bomb detector?
First of all, it is important for you to know and understand why the iPhone was chosen to be the ideal prop to act as the chemical bomb detector. Scientists opine that it is mainly the iPhone’s ability to function long duration (considering its substantial battery life) and its operating ability using low wattage; apart from its apparent popularity for third party developers that makes iPhone promising in this context.
According to reports from NASA scientists in LiveScience, the stamp-size iPhone plug-in would also work in unison with other correspondingly operational smartphones over a larger network or WiFi connection. The main idea behind this is to place the sensor on a larger number of smartphones (with iPhones transmitting information about chemicals over the network), so as to achieve a higher rate of detection for chemicals.
How does the sensor pug-in work
The silicon sensor chip in the plug-in is made up of 64 nanosensors, which has the capacity of tracing chemical elements such as ammonia, chlorine gas and methane. Now, while the iPhone’s GPS would contribute location coordinates, an entirely operational prototype of the device would ideally decode the chemical data and display the chemical concentration, humidity and temperature on screen. And all this is done effectively bypassing the need to analyze the data on another computer.
This can be one of the most breakthrough developments in the category of potential anti-terrorist tools. However, this isn’t the 1st one in this field; earlier researchers from Purdue University have been keeping busy designing a system that would let mobile phones to detect tiny radiation particles in the air.
Besides that, the iPhone acting as chemical sensors can also transmit alerts to fire responders about the release of dangerous chemicals. Evidences have shown that such devices can be helpful particularly in determining the best course of action when it comes to working with chemical spills.
Posted: Seuli.B
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