Source: Orlando Sentinel

    Researchers at UCF¡¯s Center for Research and Education in Optics and Lasers (CREOL) are like comic-book superheroes. They¡¯re always trying to stay one step ahead of the bad guys, and they have the ability to see through things.

    A recent invention to come out of CREOL is a pair of special goggles that let people see through clothing, plastic, ceramics, wood and paper, said Matthew Weed, a graduate research assistant at CREOL. The heat-sensitive goggles can also detect human bodies and animals through walls and at night.

    ¡°What we do is make the things that they can do on TV easier or better,¡± Weed said.

    The goggles use infrared frequency waves to detect motion of anything giving off heat. Images appear green through the goggles.

    Weed said that defense research groups in CREOL are working on improving this technology, which has already been used by the military and government.

    Researchers are also working with another type of frequency known as terahertz, or T-rays.

    Because of their short wavelengths, T-rays, frequency units equal to one trillion hertz, can pass through most materials except metal and water.

    Amitabh Ghoshal, a graduate research assistant at CREOL, said that the use of T-ray imaging may soon be used to detect weapons hidden underneath clothing.

    He noted that ceramic guns have recently become available that are undetectable by standard metal detectors.

    But because the ceramic guns are so dense, T-ray imaging devices can still detect them. The T-ray waves could detect any solid object under a person¡¯s clothing and then produce the image back on a screen.

    Weed added that researchers are working to develop large T-ray screens to view crowds of people and allow for more effective security in airports.

    Ghoshal said that there would have to be some debate to determine if this kind of technology is an invasion of privacy.

    ¡°As far as I can tell, the privacy laws were written with ideas about privacy before this kind of technology was possible,¡± Ghoshal said. ¡°It will probably take some debate exactly where this [kind of imaging technology] falls in the spectrum of private to public.¡±

    Weed added that the low resolution of the T-ray images won¡¯t expose too much of a person¡¯s body.

    ¡°It¡¯s not that we just see through their clothes and can see everything else,¡± Weed said. ¡°It¡¯s more like we see ghostly images of them that would show, brightly, something solid like a gun or a knife or a phone or a camera for that matter.¡±

    T-rays can also be used to see through skin to detect abnormalities in the body.

    According to the Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute¡¯s Center for Terahertz Research Web site, T-rays offer advantages that conventional imaging technology, such as X-rays, does not. T-rays¡¯ low energy levels allow for the imaging of human tissue without harmful radiation, making them safer than X-rays.

    ¡°If you look around you, optics permeates so many technologies,¡± said Jannick Rolland, associate professor of optics at CREOL.

    Researchers at CREOL are working to create T-ray, laser-based imaging tools. Rolland said these devices will allow doctors to probe a skin lesion in a fraction of a second. The image will show any signs of early or advanced stages of cancer in the body, without having to actually cut a portion of skin off.

    ¡°Medicine of the future will move away from animal models and be able to operate on engineered tissue that can be probed with light, non-destructively, to study new drugs or vaccines,¡± Rolland said.