Chinese scientists develop technology that can detect hidden object over a kilometre away
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A pulse laser was thrown onto a wall inside the flat, which scattered the light in different directions
Chinese researchers have developed a technology that they claim could see an object hidden over a kilometre far.
The scientists say that non-line-of-sight (NLOS) imaging could be used for everything from policing to defence, reports SCMP.
According to the research paper published earlier this month in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, the researchers at the University of Science and Technology set up a laster emitter
at their campus in Urban Shanghai and hid a mannequin behind a flat-screen inside a flat 1.43 km away.
A pulse laser was thrown onto a wall inside the flat, which scattered the light in different directions.
Some of the photons were reflected on to the mannequin, while others travelled to a sensor placed next to the laser emitter.
The photons that struck the hidden object were then reflected back onto the wall and bounced back a third time to hit the sensor.
The researchers then calculated how far each part of the mannequin was placed and recreate a three-dimensional image through an algorithm.
"This range is about three orders of magnitude longer than previous experiments," the scientists said in the article.
"The results will open avenues for the development of NLOS imaging techniques and relevant applications to real-world conditions."