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Welcome to the February edition of Stay Informed focusing this month on innovation.
The single most important thing an innovator must do, whatever the size of the company he or she represents, is to get their technology road-tested, used and, most importantly seen and talked about. The following profiles offer excellent examples of technologies which have been successfully nutured and have bridged the all-important gap between laboratory and marketplace.
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us.
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Tarsier™ is an award-winning radar system that can detect very small items of potentially dangerous debris on airport runways. The system has been successfully demonstrated at London Heathrow and New York's JFK Airport and the first system sale was in July 2005 to Vancouver International Airport.
Debris on runways is a major issue for airports and airlines. The estimated worldwide annual cost of debris damage and delays is £2.3 billion. A small strip of metal on the runway was a major contributory factor in bringing down Concorde flight AF4590 on 25 July 2000 as it left Paris Charles de Gaulle airport.
Eliminating runway debris
Tarsier wins The Wall Street Journal's Innovation Award for Transporta
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This is a very high specification Global Position System (GPS) platform which allows users to quickly fix on a target - be it human, equipment, or moving vehicles.
QinetiQ GPS solutions also enable public services, such as the police force, to integrate GPS positioning information with their other information databases.
QinetiQ has a long heritage of GPS technology development. The GPS system which was developed to help test aircraft for the future Joint Strike Aircraft (JSF), permitting the famous Aircraft Advanced flight Control (VAAC) Harrier to land automatically on the deck of HMS Invincible, is now being delivered into the hands of commercial customers.
Once again here is a compelling example of defence requirements driving innovation for commercial needs.
Current applications for QinetiQ's GPS technology include missile and container tracking and prisoner tagging.
GPS solutions
Assett Management solutions
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QinetiQ has developed ZephIR™, a unique piece of laser technology that can measure wind speed, direction and shear up to 150m in height.
ZephIR™, which provides developers with a clear picture of wind flow and behaviour at a particular site, can help to ensure optimal siting of wind farms and assess operational turbine performance.
The system is based on LiDAR (Light Detection And Ranging) and works by measuring the Doppler shift of radiation
scattered from a moving object.
The growing emphasis on generating substantial amounts of energy from renewable sources has highlighted the need for a more versatile and cost effective means to assess wind resources prior to wind farm installation and during operation.
In addition, the problems encountered in the assessment of complex sites have highlighted the growing requirement for a robust wind measurement solution.
QinetiQ understands the market need to reduce development risk, cost, improve site assessment and accelerate the planning process.
QinetiQ's LiDAR systems promise large improvements in cost, compactness and reliability over traditional LiDAR.
ZephIR - lidar wind speed measurement
Smart thinking
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Upstart is a mechanised and fully self-contained rapid ascender. It can safely take a person carrying equipment with a total weight of up to 200kg up a free-hanging rope at a speed of over 10 feet per second and it can 'climb' over 600ft on a single charge. Recharging takes between
60-90 minutes.
Manually ascending a rope causes fatigue, so being able to ascend without effort is advantageous in both military and rescue scenarios. The system has been assessed and demonstrated by independent company Technical Rescue which describes UPSTART 'as an effective system of meeting operational needs which are usually conducted under adverse
conditions.' UPSTART was originally developed by QinetiQ for Special Forces operations and is shortly to be released into service.
QinetiQ helps people rapidly climb to the top
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