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Technology

Quartz rods could provide instant bomb detector

By Paul Marks

20 January 2010

New Scientist. Science news and long reads from expert journalists, covering developments in science, technology, health and the environment on the website and the magazine.

Destroyed by a TATP bomb

(Image: Dylan Martinez/PA archive/PA)

A CHEAP artificial nose promises to make it much easier to detect the explosive triacetone triperoxide. The device could be installed in the doorways of buses, trains and airports to sound an alarm if someone carrying TATP crosses the threshold.

Attention started to focus on TATP following its use in the 7 July 2005 bus and tube bombings in London, and the attacks on trains the previous year in Madrid, Spain. The explosive can be made using easily obtainable domestic chemicals and has explosive power similar to TNT.

But TATP’s high…

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