ALERT | Awareness and Localization of Explosive-Related Threats

SPARC Webinar: September 16

Hybrid X-ray Transmission + Diffraction Systems for Aviation Security and Beyond

The slides and video presentation of the September 16th webinar is now available online!

The seventh webinar of the SPARC (Seminars to Promote ALERT Research and Collaboration) Webinar series will continue on September 16th from 11:30am – 12:00pm EDT. More information on the presentation can be found below:

Title: Hybrid X-ray Transmission + Diffraction Systems for Aviation Security and Beyond

Presenters:

Dr. Joel Greenberg, Associate Research Professor in the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering, Duke University

Dr. David Coccarelli, Vice President of Operations, Quadridox, Inc.

Dr. Christopher Gregory, Principal Scientist for Imaging, Smiths Detection

Abstract: 

Everyone knows not to judge a book by its cover, but less well-known is not to judge a suitcase by its zippers or a pallet by the manifest. X-rays have provided a non-destructive look into the interior of objects to find concealed items for over a century. As the technology has matured, so also has the associated detection goals: distinguishing explosives, opioids, or malignant tumors from their very prevalent confusers requires that we measure material-specific features that go beyond shape and density. One way to accomplish this involves combining X-ray transmission and diffraction into a hybrid measurement system. This hybrid X-ray system involves system integration at the hardware and software levels, and promises improvements to false alarm and detection performance in a variety of security applications. In this talk, I discuss the status of my collaborative efforts with other university and industry partners to understand and demonstrate just such a hybrid transmission + X-ray diffraction system.

Speaker Bios: 

Dr. Joel Greenberg is an Associate Research Professor in the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering and a member of the faculty of Medical Physics at Duke University. While Dr. Greenberg has worked in a range of areas, including cold atom physics and nonlinear optics, his current research is focused on computational sensing across the electromagnetic spectrum (from ELF to X-rays) and its application to areas such as medicine and security. He developed coded aperture X-ray diffraction tomography and has pioneered its application to soft tissue analysis and explosives detection. Dr. Greenberg received his B.S.E. in mechanical engineering from Princeton University and his PhD in physics from Duke University.

Dr. David Coccarelli has spent most of his professional and academic careers working on image reconstruction and system analysis as they pertain to X-ray systems. He has worked in the aviation security space since 2014 when he started research into X-ray simulation and system analysis as a graduate student at Duke University. He wrote his dissertation on information-theoretic analysis of X-ray systems and helped to develop a number of X-ray simulation and analysis tools. Dr. Coccarelli has been the Vice President of Operations at Quadridox, Inc. since 2019 where he helps lead the transition of novel technologies from academia to industry.

Dr. Christopher Gregory is a Principal Scientist for Imaging at Smiths Detection. He has thirty years of experience in pattern recognition, image analysis, image processing, and signal processing for medical, defense, homeland defense and academic applications. He has led DHS and TSA funded research efforts involving machine learning algorithms and mm wave people screening in the past, and is currently leading the x-ray diffraction effort at Smiths Detection.

If you are interested in attending or have any questions, please reach out to Tiffany Lam at [email protected] for more information.