Textile influence on remote identification of explosives in the THz range

In this study common clothing and variety of textile materials were used in research on its influence on remote materials identification. Experimental setup was designed for the terahertz reflection spectroscopy of different materials located at a distance up to 5 m. The source of the radiation is a tunable solid-state optical parametric oscillator (OPO), which generates a narrow-band nanosecond pulses in the range of 0.7-2.7 THz. The signal is detected with hot electron bolometer (HEB). Investigations were carried out for 1 m, 3 m and 5 m distance between the examined sample and the system. Experiment was conducted in the 0.7 – 2.5 THz range. Fabrics subjected to testing were varied in terms of the fibers kind which they were made from and weights of test materials ranged from 53 g/m2 up to 420 g/m2. Also textiles with a composition consisting of several fibers with differing percentage of the fibers composition of each sample were measured. Information about textiles transmission was obtained in separate set of experiments. The study fabrics were made of viscose, polyester, cotton, spandex, wool, nylon, leather, flax.