X-RAY INSPECTION SYSTEM THAT INTEGRATES MANIFEST DATA WITH IMAGING/DETECTION PROCESSING

• US 20130101172A1
• Filed: 09/07/2012
• Published: 04/25/2013
• Est. Priority Date: 09/07/2011
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Rapiscan Systems Incorporated (OSI Systems Incorporated)
• Original Assignee: Rapiscan Systems Incorporated (OSI Systems Incorporated)
• Inventors: Sankaranarayanan, Balamurugan, Kumar, Siva, Abel, Jeffery Bryan, Parikh, Shehul Sailesh
• Granted Patent: US 9,111,331 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 382/104
• CPC Class Codes: G01V 5/22 Active interrogation, i.e. by irradiating objects or goods using external radiation sources, e.g. using gamma rays or cosmic rays
• CPC Class Codes: G01V 5/271 using a network, e.g. a remote expert, accessing remote data or the like
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 10/0838 Historical data
• CPC Class Codes: G06T 2207/10116 X-ray image
• CPC Class Codes: G06T 2207/30248 Vehicle exterior or interior
• CPC Class Codes: G06T 7/0004 Industrial image inspection
• CPC Class Codes: G06T 7/001 using an image reference approach
• CPC Class Codes: G08B 13/194 using image scanning and comparing systems

Abstract

The present specification discloses systems and methods for integrating manifest data for cargo and light vehicles with their X-ray images generated during scanning Manifest data is automatically imported into the system for each shipment, and helps the security personnel to quickly determine the contents of cargo. In case of a mismatch between cargo contents shown by manifest data and the X-ray images, the cargo may be withheld for further inspection. In one embodiment, the process of analyzing the X-ray image of the cargo in conjunction with the manifest data is automated.

Claims

1. A system for scanning cargo and vehicles, the system comprising:

at least one non-intrusive inspection system for performing a non-intrusive X-ray scan, said non-intrusive inspection system further comprising an application for importing manifest data associated with the cargo or vehicle being scanned; and

a processing system for receiving scan images and associated manifest data from the non-intrusive inspection system, and determining from the scan images if the contents of the cargo or vehicle are of the same type as specified in the manifest data.

2. The system of claim 1, wherein the scan images and manifest data are analyzed by an operator at a regional center to determine if the contents match.

3. The system of claim 1, wherein the scan images and manifest data are automatically analyzed by an application at a regional center to determine if the contents match.

4. The system of claim 1, wherein each X-ray scan image is associated with a unique identifier before transmission from the service post to the regional center.

5. The system of claim 1 further comprising a server that executes an application for allocating images and manifest data from a service post to a regional center.

6. The system of claim 4, wherein scan images, their associated unique identifiers and manifest data, and results of analyses at a regional center are stored in a database.

7. A method for inspecting cargo and vehicles, comprising:

scanning a cargo container or vehicle at a service post using non-intrusive system;

importing manifest data associated with the cargo or vehicle being scanned; and

analyzing said scan images and associated manifest data to determine if the contents of the cargo or vehicle correspond to the same cargo type as specified in the manifest data.

8. The method of claim 7, wherein the non-intrusive scanning is performed by an X-ray system.

9. The method of claim 7, wherein the step of analyzing further comprises determining whether a threat item or alarm condition is present.

10. The method of claim 7, wherein the result of the analysis at a regional center is reported to the service post.

11. The method of claim 7, wherein each scan image is associated with a unique identifier before transmission from the service post to a regional center.

12. The method of claim 11, wherein the scan images, their associated unique identifiers and manifest data, and results of analyses are stored in a database.

13. A method for screening cargo, the method comprising:

scanning a cargo container using non-intrusive X-ray system to generate a scan image;

importing manifest data associated with the cargo or vehicle being scanned;

obtaining cargo code information from manifest data;

retrieving stored images associated with said cargo code from an image database; and

comparing features of said scan image to features of historically stored images to determine if the contents of the cargo or vehicle match the manifest data.

14. The method of claim 13 further comprising computing features of cargo content from the generated scan image, including but not limited to, attenuation, texture, atomic number, cargo height, density and atomic number.

15. The method of claims 14, wherein the step of comparing further comprises comparing the computed features from the scan image with features associated with historically stored images.

16. The method of claim 14, wherein the computed features are associated with said cargo code.

17. The method of claim 16, wherein the cargo code is indicative of type of cargo.

18. The method of claim 13 further comprising segregating the generated scan image according to cargo types, if the cargo is associated with more than one cargo code.

19. The method of claim 18, wherein each segregated part of the image is compared to historically stored images associated with the corresponding cargo code.

20. The method of claim 19, wherein the step of comparing said scan image to historically stored images is performed automatically.