Hypothesis tests for the detection of constant speed radiation moving sources

J. Dumazert (1) , R. Coulon (1) , Vladimir Kondrasovs (1) , K. Boudergui (1) , Guillaume Sannié (1) , J. Gameiro (1) , S. Normand (1) , Laurence Méchin (2)

1 LCAE - Laboratoire Capteurs et Architectures Electroniques
2 Equipe Electronique - Laboratoire GREYC - UMR6072

As a complement to single and multichannel detection algorithms, inefficient under too low signal-to-noise ratios, temporal correlation algorithms have been introduced to detect radiological material in motion. Test hypothesis methods based on the mean and variance of the signals delivered by the different channels have shown significant gain in terms of a tradeoff between detection sensitivity and false alarm probability. This paper discloses the concept of a new hypothesis test for temporal product detection methods, taking advantage of the Poisson nature of the registered counting signals, and establishes a benchmark between this test and its empirical counterpart. The simulation study validates that in the two relevant configurations of a pedestrian source carrier under respectively high and low count rate radioactive backgrounds, the newly introduced hypothesis test ensures a significantly improved compromise between sensitivity and false alarm, while guaranteeing the stability of its optimization parameter regardless of signal-to-noise ratio variations between 2 to 0.8.

Keywords: constant speed radiation moving source detection; single detection algorithm; multichannel detection algorithm; signal-to-noise ratios; temporal correlation algorithms; radiological material detection; hypothesis methods; channel signal variance; detection sensitivity tradeoff; false alarm probability; temporal product detection methods; Poisson nature; registered counting signals; pedestrian source carrier; Benchmark testing; count rate radioactive backgrounds; Trajectory; optimization parameter; Correlation; Random variables; Sensitivity; Detectors; nuclear materials safeguards; radiation detection; Signal to noise ratio; solid scintillation detectors

Domains: Nuclear Experiment [nucl-ex]; Signal and Image Processing; Methodology [stat.ME]; Computational Physics [physics.comp-ph]

J. Dumazert, R. Coulon, Vladimir Kondrasovs, K. Boudergui, Guillaume Sannié, et al.. Hypothesis tests for the detection of constant speed radiation moving sources. 2015 4th International Conference on Advancements in Nuclear Instrumentation Measurement Methods and their Applications (ANIMMA), Apr 2015, Lisbon, Portugal. pp.7465524, ⟨10.1109/ANIMMA.2015.7465524⟩. ⟨cea-01823366⟩