Patent ID: 7218105

Claim:
An apparatus for exciting and detecting NQR in a substance containing quadrupole nuclei responsive to the NQR phenomenon, comprising: An irradiator to irradiate an item that may contain a substance with RF waves to excite NQR in quadrupole nuclei within the substance and to receive an NQR signal emitted in response thereto; a transmitter to produce and transmit an RF pulse to the irradiator to create said RF waves; a receiver to receive and treat a received signal from said irradiator for subsequent processing and detection of a said NQR signal therein; a sensor to sense an extraneous parameter or parameters that may influence the detection of the NQR signal from the item to be irradiated prior to operation of the transmitter and to generate a sensor signal corresponding to the extraneous parameter or parameters sensed; and a processor to process the sensor signal to control the operation of the transmitter depending on the sensor signal prior to creating said RF waves, and to control the operation of the receiver, to facilitate the excitation and detection of an NQR signal, and to process the treated received signal to identify an NQR signal therein.