Iceni Labs details SafeScan see-through-walls radar system

Iceni Labs, a UK-based technology accelerator, has detailed its prototype SafeScan radar: a handheld technology developed by the company to help users detect humans behind walls. It currently has an unspecified UK customer.

“SafeScan uses ultra-wideband radar technology, which is not a new technology,” Alexander Giles, chief commercial officer of Iceni Labs, told Janes on 28 September. However, SafeScan uses an unique algorithm to look for movement and assess whether it has detected a human breathing, Giles said.

The SafeScan sensor was designed and developed by Iceni Labs using a number of civil developments and innovative solutions. (Iceni Labs )

“The algorithm has been tested in a medical environment, to monitor the overnight breathing of 400 hospital patients for a year,” he added. This means that the algorithm has learnt to differentiate between sources of movement and assess whether or not those movements are human. According to Giles, it can measure a human’s breathing pattern to within a quarter of a breath per minute.

He said Iceni Labs is “constantly working on the algorithm and machine learning, two of our team are working on the software right now”. He added that the algorithms provide an element of sensitivity to the product and help to move away from false positives and negatives.

SafeScan does not attempt to create a picture of what is behind a wall, a task requiring significant power and computing systems, according to Giles.