Magnetic gradient and neutron backscattering fusion for landmine detection

Demining of abandoned minefields is a serious environmental problem for many countries worldwide. The main problem in landmine clearance is how to discriminate between a landmine, and other buried clutter. A single sensor for demining may have detection rate which is too low, or false alarm rate which is too high. Thus, combination of two or more complementary sensors will improve the detection performance. In this paper, we present an algorithm for the fusion between magnetic gradiometer and neutron backscattering data for landmine detection. Whereas magnetic gradiometer can distinguish the metal content of a landmine, nuclear backscattering technique focuses on detecting the explosive content of a landmine. Furthermore, the proposed algorithm was implemented on a microcontroller chip, to enhance the deminer decision toward any suspected object in the minefield.