Patent ID: 11860333
Assignee: THE GOVERNMENT OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA, REPRESENTED BY THE SECRETARY OF HOMELAND SECURITY
Field: Measurement (Instruments)
Classification: CPC G | IPC G

Claim 29:
30. A screening system comprising:
a sensor array to sense a gravitational field caused by an item;
a conveyor that includes a turntable configured to rotate the item through a plurality of sensing positions for scanning by the sensor array; and
a controller configured to:
direct the conveyor to rotate the item to a current sensing position of a plurality of sensing positions for the sensor array;
acquire gravitational measurement information from the sensor array for the current sensing position, the gravitational measurement information corresponding to an absolute measurement of a gravitational field as affected by the item in the current sensing position;
incrementally rotate the item and repeat, for additional sensing positions, acquiring gravitational measurement information for remaining ones of the plurality of sensing positions;
generate a mass map of the item by processing the gravitational measurement information for the plurality of sensing positions,
the mass map being a mass measurement vector including a mass image across a surface of the item resolved to a sensor resolution of the sensor array; and
perform tomographic reconstruction to generate a tomographic image of the item, using the mass map as a static mass input vector for the tomographic reconstruction.