 |
RF-Capture Lets MIT Boffins See Through Walls
RF-Capture works by sending out radio waves; when they strike an individual behind a wall, reflections come back to the device for analysis. RF-Capture measures the intensity of the return waves, among other variables, and then uses an algorithm to put together a rudimentary silhouette model of the person’s body type.
(RF-Capture video)
We present RF-Capture, a system that captures the human figure – i.e., a coarse skeleton – through a wall. RF-Capture tracks the 3D positions of a person’s limbs and body parts even when the person is fully occluded from its sensor, and does so without placing any markers on the subject’s body.In designing RF-Capture, we built on recent advances in wireless research, which have shown that certain radio frequency (RF) signals can traverse walls and re-flect off the human body, allowing for the detection of human motion through walls. In contrast to these past systems which abstract the entire human body as a single point and find the overall location of that point through walls, we show how we can reconstruct various human body parts and stitch them together to capture the human figure.
We built a prototype of RF-Capture and tested it on 15 subjects. Our results show that the system can capture a representative human figure through walls and use it to distinguish between various users.
SF movie fans may recall the device from the 1997 film The Fifth Element; police used a hand-held device to see through doorways in to apartments.
Fans of sf literature have of course enjoyed various versions of this technology for many years. Consider the Subphoton Search Ray from The Shining One (1937, Nat Schachner), the Probability Time Wave Tube from Elimination (1936, John W. Campbell) and the X-Beam Projector from Diamond Planetoid (1937, Gordon A. Giles).
If you're excited about seeing through walls (and who isn't?), take a look at Four Devices That see Through Walls.
Via BGR.
Scroll down for more stories in the same category. (Story submitted 10/23/2015)
Follow this kind of news @Technovelgy.| Email | RSS | Blog It | Stumble | del.icio.us | Digg | Reddit |
Would
you like to contribute a story tip?
It's easy:
Get the URL of the story, and the related sf author, and add
it here.
Comment/Join discussion ( 0 )
Related News Stories - (" Surveillance ")
Zephyr Solar-Electric Stratospheric Drone
'The planes flew continuously, twenty-four hours a day...' - EB White, 1950.
Robot Hummingbird Hovers Biomimetically
'With a buzz... it started out on its journey.' - Raymond Z. Gallun, 1936.
Capitalist Big Brother Co-Opts Regular Big Brother
'It was even conceivable that they watched everybody all the time.' - George Orwell, 1948.
Juggalo Face Paint Disrupts Facial Recognition
'... designed to foil facial recognition systems.' - Neal Stephenson, 2019
Technovelgy (that's tech-novel-gee!) is devoted to the creative science inventions and ideas of sf authors. Look for the Invention Category that interests you, the Glossary, the Invention Timeline, or see what's New.
Current News
Road Noise Charges Electric Cars With Peugeot Piezoelectric Billboard
''... major cities of Earth have free electrical power conveniently processed from their own noise.'
Unsinkable Metal Latest Gates Obsession
'A metal... light as cork.'
M-Blocks 2.0 Self-Assembling Robots
'Faster the cubes moved...'
NASA 'Broomstick' Recalls SciFi Ideas
'The appearance was enough like a giant witch's broom to justify the nickname.'
Orbital Display's Low Earth Orbit Advertisements
'A vast circle of scarlet stars came up into the greenish desert dusk.'
Neuromorphic Computing Hardare
'He had constructed an organ, a brain, of metal, entirely inorganic and lifeless...'
Vascularized Human Skin 3D Printed
Hey Fishboy!
Trillionaires Still Earth-Bound
'I shall never forget the sight... when the yellow gleam of the precious metal appeared under the star dust.'
Digit V2 Bipedal Robot From Agility Robotics
Oh, and now I suppose someone will develop the robotic porch pirate.
3D Printed Dubai Building Is World's Largest
'This thing will start at one end of ...a house and build it complete to the other end, following drawings only.'
Grow Plants On Moon Or Mars!
'In contrast to the airless desolation outside, the interior of this five-acre greenhouse was the one most desirable place to be.'
California Gets Shockwave Rider-Style Avoidance Zones
'It was cheaper to pay the refugees to go without up-to-the-minute equipment.'
Microbot Interstellar von Neumann Explorers
'Evidently they have never had a planet of their own...'
Hail SmartCan! Your Trash Bin Takes Itself Out
'...a waste can twenty feet away stirred into life.'
Finally! Microsoft Surface Neo And Surface Duo Implement Excellent Courier Idea
'Runcible, whose pages were thicker and more densely packed with computational machinery...'
Tap Strap 2 Now With Air Mouse
'He waved his hand and the circuit switched abruptly.'
