Now low-cost ‘e-dogs’ to sniff out explosives

 AHMEDABAD, February7 2012:Services of sniffer dogs will no more be required at high-security, sensitive spots like airports and railway stations with Indian researchers successfully developing a low-cost electronic sensor machine to detect deadly explosives like RDX.Scientists at the Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) in Mumbai toiled for five years to dream up ‘e-dogs’ which detect the faintest of scents with their in-built sensors instantly zeroing in on a person carrying explosives. Giving this information, IIT’s Prof V Ramgopal Rao, also said here that the wireless explosive detector was made from cantilevers, each of which was the main nano sensor element. He said the ‘electronic nose’, which resembled the present hand-held metal detector, would be mass-produced next year and would be available for use in even shops at a cost of only Rs1,000 compared to the huge expenses of training and maintaining sniffer dogs or the explosive units each of which cost Rs1 million. In the e-dog, the cantilever is coated with a chemical that reacts with the explosive. The chemical binds with the RDX molecule generating stress, which is converted into an electrical signal. This signal is wirelessly transmitted to a control station. “It is this chemical that ‘sniffs’ the RDX out”, said Prof Rao.