CQ Homeland Security - DHS Wants Cell Phones to Detect Chemical, Radioactive Material
DHS Wants Cell Phones to Detect Chemical, Radioactive Material
By Rob Margetta, CQ Staff
American cell phones can already check e-mail, surf the Internet and store music, but they could have a new set of features in coming years: the Department of Homeland Security wants them to sense biological, chemical and radioactive material.
Putting hazardous material sensors in commercial cell phones has been discussed in scientific circles for years, according to researchers in the field. More recently, the idea gained support among government agencies, and DHS said publicly in May that it wants businesses to start coming up with proposals.
At the 2007 DHS Science and Technology Stakeholders Conference, S&T Director of Innovation Roger McGinnis outlined how the system could work. Cell phone sensors would continually test the air for harmful compounds and digitally relay any information to a central monitoring system if they find anything amiss.
“It’s a great way to get millions of detectors out there,” McGinnis said.
Like the built-in GPS function many cell phones now offer, customers would have the option of turning the sensors off, McGinnis said.
S&T spokesman Christopher Kelly said the theoretical system’s strength would lie in the sheer number of sensors. The cell phone sensors might be less sophisticated than highly advanced ones some developers are fitting into hand-held models, but they would make up for it in what Kelly called “ubiquitous detection.”
If just one went off, it could be ruled a false positive, he said. But if several detected a harmful compound, emergency workers would know there was a problem, triangulate the phones’ location react to the situation.
“Cell phones that are now made have GPS technology,” Kelly said. “And, if you have a cell phone equipped with that, it can transmit the time and place of an event.”
The proposal has a working name, “Cell-All,” but is far from a contract phase at this point. Kelly said S&T has not even reached the point of sending out Broad Agency Announcements — which present problems or challenges to the business community and ask for solutions — to potential developers.
DHS Wants Cell Phones to Detect Chemical, Radioactive Material
By Rob Margetta, CQ Staff
American cell phones can already check e-mail, surf the Internet and store music, but they could have a new set of features in coming years: the Department of Homeland Security wants them to sense biological, chemical and radioactive material.
Putting hazardous material sensors in commercial cell phones has been discussed in scientific circles for years, according to researchers in the field. More recently, the idea gained support among government agencies, and DHS said publicly in May that it wants businesses to start coming up with proposals.
At the 2007 DHS Science and Technology Stakeholders Conference, S&T Director of Innovation Roger McGinnis outlined how the system could work. Cell phone sensors would continually test the air for harmful compounds and digitally relay any information to a central monitoring system if they find anything amiss.
“It’s a great way to get millions of detectors out there,” McGinnis said.
Like the built-in GPS function many cell phones now offer, customers would have the option of turning the sensors off, McGinnis said.
S&T spokesman Christopher Kelly said the theoretical system’s strength would lie in the sheer number of sensors. The cell phone sensors might be less sophisticated than highly advanced ones some developers are fitting into hand-held models, but they would make up for it in what Kelly called “ubiquitous detection.”
If just one went off, it could be ruled a false positive, he said. But if several detected a harmful compound, emergency workers would know there was a problem, triangulate the phones’ location react to the situation.
“Cell phones that are now made have GPS technology,” Kelly said. “And, if you have a cell phone equipped with that, it can transmit the time and place of an event.”
The proposal has a working name, “Cell-All,” but is far from a contract phase at this point. Kelly said S&T has not even reached the point of sending out Broad Agency Announcements — which present problems or challenges to the business community and ask for solutions — to potential developers.
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