MOTOR (Italian PNRM)
Project acronym: MOTOR
Project full title: Development of distributed sensors for monitoring and detection of chemical/biological threats
Funding: the project is financially supported by the Italian Ministry of Defense through the PNRM
Area: Smart Sensors
- Topic
- Detection of chemical/biological threats
- Objectives
- Development of distributed sensors for homeland security application. The network makes use of two complementary techniques for sensing in the gas and in the liquid phase: hollow fiber based IRAS, and opto-chemical chip
- Role of CREO
- Development of the sensor for C sensing in the vapour phase.
- Sensing solution / Technology developed by CREO (concept patented by Leonardo S.p.A.)
- The sensing scheme patented by Leonardo SpA is based on Hollowf-Fiber Infrared Absorption Spectroscopy.
- Source and detector are placed tens of meters apart, and coupled by an unrolled hollow fiber, that acts, at the same time, as an optical coupler and a gas cell. Air is sampled and circulated inside the fiber by a mini-pump, through micro-holes equally spaced along the fiber.
- The fiber can be spread to ground, cabled to walls, or unrolled inside air ducts. The sensor fits very well indoor scenarios with strong spatial constraints
TRL: 3
A breadboard with a fiber length of 2 meters tested succesfully with solvents and with CWA simulants with LoD in the 100s ppb and with a response time of few seconds from sampling to reporting.
