A Clear Road Ahead- Developing a Combined Technological and Socio-Economic Approach to Freeing Affected Communities from Anti-Vehicle Landmines

前方道路清晰——制定技术和社会经济相结合的方法，使受影响社区免受反车辆地雷的侵害

• 批准号: EP/P02906X/1
• 负责人: Panagiotis Kosmas
• 金额: $ 128.91万
• 依托单位: King's College London
• 依托单位国家: 英国
• 项目类别: Research Grant
• 财政年份: 2017
• 资助国家: 英国
• 起止时间: 2017 至 无数据
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://gtr.ukri.org/projects?ref=EP%2FP02906X%2F1
• 关键词: Clear; Road; Ahead; Developing; Combined

Clearing landmines both saves and improves lives in numerous different ways. Demining can help a community access agricultural land, markets and food supply, schools, hospitals and other essential services, through the clearing of transportation links and routes. By clearing anti-personnel (AP) and anti-vehicle mines (AVMs) from roads and fields, people and communities are reconnected, and this can bring huge socio-economic benefits to developing countries where these are most needed. Clearing AVMs from roads can also be a prerequisite for other aid agencies and government services to access remote communities. It restores freedom of movement and fosters freedom from fear. However, efforts to clear roads and fields from the threat of landmines are complicated by two issues: 1) the slow speed of current demining approaches particularly for certain classes of landmine; and 2) the need to prioritise the order in which different areas and land types are cleared for maximum benefit in the shortest possible timeframe. We propose a project to tackle both of these issues, creating a new technological tool for detecting landmines alongside a methodology for examining cultural, political, and socio-economic factors at the national, district, and even community levels. This approach can guarantee the deployment of the technology for the greatest possible benefit in the shortest possible time. To the best of our knowledge this is the first time that a combined strategy of this kind has been attempted. The particular target of the project is minimum-metal AVMs laid in roads and fields, which is a class of landmines that is very difficult to detect by other methods, and thus very slow and costly to clear. Beyond this synergistic approach, the project will benefit from the unique advantages of our proposed technology for the clearance of AVMs. This is because our sensor relies on a frequency-sensitive detection of the explosive material, which is contained in large quantities in anti-vehicle mines.The sensor's underlying technology is based on a quadrupole resonance (QR) approach, which relies on a simple detection mechanism: a pulse or series of radiofrequency (RF) pulses is applied at a particular frequency for the explosives of interest, and the presence (or absence) of a return signal is sought. As with metal detectors, a specially-designed planar RF antenna is placed close to ground level and fed with a sequence of RF pulses at or close to the QR frequency of the explosive to be detected. The same antenna is then used to detect the weak signals emitted by the explosive following the excitation. The important difference from metal detection is that it is the actual explosive contained within the mine that is detected and not any feature of the mine (such as the casing or the trigger), so the false alarm rate is low. This is particularly important for humanitarian demining, which aims to clear most, if not all, of the landmines in the interrogated terrain.

清除地雷以许多不同的方式拯救和改善生命。排雷可通过清理交通联系和路线，帮助社区获得农业用地、市场和粮食供应、学校、医院和其他基本服务。通过清除道路和田野中的杀伤人员地雷和反车辆地雷，人们和社区重新联系起来，这可以为最需要这些地雷的发展中国家带来巨大的社会经济利益。清除道路上的自动取款机也是其他援助机构和政府服务进入偏远社区的先决条件。它恢复了行动自由，培养了免于恐惧的自由。然而，清除道路和田野不受地雷威胁的努力因两个问题而变得复杂：1)目前的排雷方法速度缓慢，特别是某些类型的地雷；2)需要确定清除不同地区和土地类型的优先次序，以便在尽可能短的时间内获得最大利益。我们提出了一个解决这两个问题的项目，创造了一种探测地雷的新技术工具，同时提出了一种在国家、地区甚至社区各级审查文化、政治和社会经济因素的方法。这种方法可以保证在尽可能短的时间内部署该技术，以获得最大可能的好处。据我们所知，这是第一次尝试这种综合战略。该项目的具体目标是铺设在道路和田野中的金属最少的自动杀伤人员地雷，这是一种用其他方法很难探测到的地雷，因此清除起来非常缓慢和昂贵。除了这种协同方法外，该项目还将受益于我们提议的用于清除自动取款机的技术的独特优势。这是因为我们的传感器依赖于对反车辆地雷中大量含有的爆炸性物质的频率敏感检测。传感器的基本技术基于四极共振(QR)方法，该方法依赖于一个简单的检测机制：以特定频率对感兴趣的爆炸物施加一个或一系列射频(RF)脉冲，并寻找返回信号的存在(或不存在)。与金属探测器一样，一个特别设计的平面射频天线被放置在靠近地面的地方，并以被探测爆炸物的QR频率或接近被探测爆炸物的QR频率的频率向其馈送一系列射频脉冲。然后，使用相同的天线来检测炸药在激发后发出的微弱信号。与金属探测的重要区别在于，探测到的是地雷内实际含有的爆炸物，而不是地雷的任何特征(如弹壳或触发器)，因此误警率很低。这对人道主义排雷尤其重要，其目的是清除被审问地区的大部分地雷，即使不是全部地雷。

项目成果

Landmine Clearance and Peacebuilding: Evidence from Somaliland

扫雷与建设和平：来自索马里兰的证据

• DOI: 10.1177/15423166211068324
• 发表时间: 2021
• 期刊: Journal of Peacebuilding & Development
• 作者: Ikpe E

Improving Detection of a Portable NQR System for Humanitarian Demining Using Machine Learning

• DOI: 10.1109/tgrs.2021.3101226
• 发表时间: 2021
• 期刊: IEEE Transactions on Geoscience and Remote Sensing
• 影响因子: 8.2
• 作者: Yui Otagaki;J. Barras;Panagiotis Kosmas

Website presenting the key elements of the developed methodology for evaluating the impact of mine clearance

网站介绍了评估排雷影响的已开发方法的关键要素

• 发表时间: 2018
• 作者: Elias Papaioannou

The Socio-Economic Impact of Anti-Vehicle Mines in Angola.

安哥拉反车辆地雷的社会经济影响。

• 发表时间: 2019
• 作者: Hoyos Iborra Á

Tackling a deadly legacy

处理致命的遗产

• DOI: 10.1111/2057-1615.12256
• 发表时间: 2018
• 期刊: London Business School Review
• 作者: PAPAIOANNOU E