Observations on syntactic landmine detection using impulse ground-penetrating radar

Ahmed O. Nasif; Kenneth J. Hintz

doi:10.1117/12.884288

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23 May 2011 Observations on syntactic landmine detection using impulse ground-penetrating radar

Ahmed O. Nasif, Kenneth J. Hintz

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Proceedings Volume 8017, Detection and Sensing of Mines, Explosive Objects, and Obscured Targets XVI; 80171M (2011) https://doi.org/10.1117/12.884288
Event: SPIE Defense, Security, and Sensing, 2011, Orlando, Florida, United States

Abstract

We discuss some results and observations on applying syntactic pattern recognition (SPR) methodology for landmine detection using impulse ground-penetrating radar (GPR). In the SPR approach, the GPR A-scans are first converted into binary-valued strings by inverse filtering, followed by concavity detection to identify the peaks and valleys representing the locations of impedance discontinuities in the return signal. During the training phase, the characteristic binary strings for a particular landmine are found by looking at all the exemplars of that mine and selecting the collection of strings that yield the best detection results on these exemplars. These characteristic strings can be detected very efficiently using finite state machines (FSMs). Finally, the FSM detections are clustered to assign confidence to each detection, and discard sparse detections. Provided that the impulse GPR provides enough resolution in range, the SPR method can be a robust and high-speed solution for landmine detection and classification, because it aims to exploit the impedance discontinuity profile of the target, which is a description of the internal material structure of the target and little affected by external clutter. To evaluate the proposed methodology, the SPR scheme is applied to a set of impulse GPR data taken at a government test site. We suggest that coherent frequency-agile radar may be a better option for the SPR approach, since it addresses some of the drawbacks of a non-coherent impulse GPR caused by internally non-coherent within-channel signals which necessitate non-coherent integration and its attendant longer integration times, and non-coherent adjacent channels which severely limit the ability to do spatial, or at a minimum, cross-range processing if the GPR is in a linear array antenna.

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Ahmed O. Nasif and Kenneth J. Hintz "Observations on syntactic landmine detection using impulse ground-penetrating radar", Proc. SPIE 8017, Detection and Sensing of Mines, Explosive Objects, and Obscured Targets XVI, 80171M (23 May 2011); https://doi.org/10.1117/12.884288

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