Finding Explosives with Laser Beams

Scientists at Vienna University of Technology have found a way to detect chemicals over long distances, even if they are enclosed in containers. People like to keep a safe distance from explosive substances, but in order to analyze them, close contact is usually inevitable. At the Vienna University of Technology, a new method has now been developed to detect chemicals inside a container over a distance of more than a hundred meters. Laser light is scattered in a very specific way by different substances. Using this light, the contents of a nontransparent container can be analyzed without opening it. Scattered Light as a "Chemical Fingerprint" - "The method we are using is Raman-spectroscopy", says Professor Bernhard Lendl (TU Vienna). The sample is irradiated with a laser beam.