Detection of Radioactive Material in Public Places: BARC's Handheld Tele Radionuclide Detector

Electronics Division, BARC has developed a compact and portable system for detection of radioactive nuclides like Co 60 , Cs 137 etc. with high levels of radioactivity. These radioactive sources, because of their long life and relative ease of availability, have the potential of being used in radiological dispersion devices (dirty bombs) for panic creation in public places. The unit comprises of a compact CsI detector, photo diode and front-end electronics, micro-controller, a GPS module and Blue-tooth connectivity. The application software running on the mobile phone provides the interface as well as transmission of data to remote server. This is highly suitable for covert operations. The person, who carries this instrument, suitably camouflaged, also has a mobile phone in his pocket, which is connected to the system via blue tooth. On detection of activity above set limit, the system sends an alarm to the mobile phone. The mobile phone can be kept in vibration mode in order to avoid any undue attention. The graphical display on screen of mobile phone provides an indication of activity and the isotope identification. Simultaneously, the mobile phone sends information about the activity detected and source identification automatically along with the location of the instrument (longitude and latitude), provided by the GPS module in the instrument, to a remote server. The remote server provides radiation information on a map with position-coordinates. Based on this, necessary action can be initiated by the security personnel.