[Engineering Feature]
Keeping Troops Out Of Harm's Way, Technically Speaking
Emerging technologies aim to improve safety and emergency care on battlefields and beyond.
Boomerang, a gunfire detection system from BBN Technologies, already uses sound-analysis technology to calculate shot paths. The device indicates the range and elevation of incoming gunfire on an LED screen display. The system, which also announces the gunfire's direction with a recorded voice, features a set of microphones mounted to an aluminum stand. "It looks like a small, very sparse Christmas tree," says Maher. "It's under a meter tall."
Currently being used in Iraq and Afghanistan, Boomerang can be set up outside a building or tent or mounted to a HUMV (Fig. 2). Future detection systems will be even more accurate, able to work with a wider range of weapons, and small enough to be held in a soldier's hand.
Maher notes that gunfire analysis is merely the first step in creating even more sophisticated sound detection systems. "A gunshot's intense energy and distinctness make it an ideal signal for rapid analysis," he says. Other sounds aren't as easy to pick apart, however.
"The military would like to have some sort of deployable surveillance," says Maher, "where the systems would have enough intelligence to distinguish between the sound of a Jeep driving by, or a horse walking through tall grass, or somebody creeping up on hands and knees."
Maher believes such technology will someday allow soldiers, as well as civilian police officers and security guards, to respond quickly to a wide range of suspicious sounds. He notes that working on gunfire detection is good practice for developing other types of noise-recognition systems.
"My feeling is that if we can't develop our software and our algorithms to work reliably with these very distinctive [gun-fire] sounds, then we're likely not going to have much luck trying to distinguish very subtle changes," says Maher.
SHOCK DETECTOR As wounded soldiers are brought to care stations and field hospitals, one of the crucial tasks facing medics, nurses, and physicians is accurately judging each patient's condition. All too often, injured soldiers are judged "stable" at field sites, and then they destabilize during flights to long-term health-care facilities located in Germany or the U.S.
"If we think somebody is stabilized, but they're not, they're going to go downhill fast," says Babs Soler, a professor of anesthesiology at the University of Massachusetts Medical School in Worcester, Mass. "You can continually monitor people in hospitals, but it's really difficult if you put somebody on a helicopter or airplane."
To improve survival rates, Soler developed a portable gadget that can spot the signs of shock long before a soldier begins to develop symptoms of the life-threatening condition. "The military has been looking for a long time at trying to be able to non-invasively monitor soldiers who are at risk for having serious medical problems, like shock," she says. "You want to know as early as possible when somebody has internal bleeding."
Based on optoelectronic technology, Soler's device detects incipient shock by monitoring three key indicators: oxygen and acid levels in muscles as well as the volume of red cells in the patient's blood, all without the need for blood draws or incisions. It comprises a console and disposable sensor that provides rapid and continual monitoring via near-infrared reflected light.
"A spectrometer measures just how much light there is at each wavelength," Soler says. "The computer contains three mathematic equations that analyze the spectrum to report on the three parameters."
The monitor is designed to stay attached to patients until they reach a fully staffed and equipped hospital. "Hopefully, the numbers stay normal throughout the entire transport," says Soler. If not, an alarm sounds to alert a nearby caregiver that anti-shock treatment is required.
"They would look at the numbers as well as other information they might have to figure out how to treat the patient," says Soler.
Soler's research was funded in part by a grant from the U.S. Department of Defense's Peer Reviewed Medical Research Program. Congress created the program in 1999 to promote military health research. Soler and her company, Reflectance Medical, are now seeking FDA approval for the device with the hope of marketing it to civilian EMT squads and trauma centers nationwide. "We hope this will be near every ICU bed," she says.
One has to wonder if Gort used such a device to monitor Klaatu's recovery.
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