They periodically take soil samples from a small mock minefield inside a fenced area at Sandia. The minefield has six unfuzed antitank mines and several surrogate mines made of plastic or consisting of metal boxes painted with explosive compounds. They also plan to conduct field tests on small, antipersonnel mines. Rodacy and Chambers periodically analyze soil samples to determine the concentration of explosive molecules that can be found at various distances from the mines. Both water and soil pose different challenges, they say.
Explosives dissolve easily in water, making it difficult to extract the explosive molecules.
Water also is often a dirty environment, with salts, organic materials and pollution interfering with the process. Soil also has interfering chemicals, and environmental factors such as moisture and temperature can affect the performance of the technology. The IMS technology already has successfully analyzed both water and soil field samples in the laboratory at the Explosives Components Facility. The technology also was successfully demonstrated in the field on San Clemente Island as part of a two-year program with the Office of Naval Research. The key now is to reduce the technology to the portable stage, which has been aided by a new IMS designed and developed by Electronic Research Group in Las Cruces and based on work done at New Mexico State University.