SBIR-STTR Award

Congress and various government agencies have recognized the problem of orphaned radioactive sources worldwide. This SBIR seeks replacement for existing operating nuclear sources of radiation in non-medical applications such as the portable nuclear density gauge (NDG), which poses two very critical national issues. First, there are an estimated 25,000 NDG units in the United States that contain radioactive material suitable for a "dirty bomb" and are being used on highway and civil construction projects. These gauges are portable and under limited control. Each year, approximately 300 of these units are reported lost or stolen to the NRC with only 150 eventually recovered. Second, since there is a cost associated with the proper disposal of NDGs, there is an incentive for some users to "lose" the units resulting in the improper disposal of these devices posing environmental hazards and economic costs. TransTech Systems, Inc. is developing a promising alternative to NDGs for the measurement of the density and moisture of engineering soil. TransTech's alternative employs electromagnetic sensing to determine material properties. The new technology has been successfully applied to measurement of asphalt and is being extended to soil density and moisture measurement.

Orphaned radioactive sources are a worldwide problem. DHS DNDO is seeking replacement technologies for non-medical orphaned nuclear devices. One such device is the Nuclear Density Gauge (NDG), which is used as a portable test instrument on construction sites where is susceptible to being lost, stolen or damaged. According to the NRC, there are about 25,000 of these units in the US. Of these, the GAO reports that 300 are reported as lost or stolen EACH year. These units pose an obvious security risk. They are also an environmental risk due to the improper disposal or damage of these units. Outside the US, there is an estimated additional 25,000 units. TransTech has developed a spectrographic impedance instrument which uses low energy electromagnetic signals to determine soil density and moisture. In Phase I, TransTech has demonstrated that its technology can achieve measurement precision comparable to a NDG and statistically identical readings with a single soil class. The Phase II objective is to demonstrate that it can be used with other soils and be a replacement for the NDG. Having already successfully commercialized a number of devices for the construction industry, TransTech is ideally positioned to transfer this technology to the market.