A detachable sensing system for safer railway journeys. THz screening and VOC evidence, brought together to help security teams decide what needs a closer look.
Hardware proposal · Team 119910 · Preliminary screening
A railway journey passes through platforms, coaches and parcel areas. Manual inspection cannot cover every space, all the time.
Our proposal adds a preliminary sensing layer to help the Railway Protection Force prioritise further checks. It brings complementary measurements to the places where staff need them.
Ganja seized across South Western Railway in 2025, reported in January 2026. Increased seizures also reflected stronger enforcement—not necessarily a rise in trafficking. Read the report ↗
This motivates the screening problem; it is not evidence that our proposed device works.
Reported cases across passenger, parcel and goods operations.
The Times of India reported that RPF seized heroin at Aluva and arrested two people. The case was handed to the railway police for further proceedings.
Station checks remain part of the wider narcotics-screening challenge.
RPF reported a seizure of foreign-manufactured cigarettes at Yeshwantpur. Customs authorities received the consignment for investigation into suspected smuggling.
Parcel screening presents a different inspection setting from passenger-coach checks.
The New Indian Express reported intensified RPF action against smoking, with 1,186 cases registered by 21 May. The report also describes the division’s broader fire-prevention effort.
This is a fire-safety context, not evidence that a general VOC sensor can reliably identify smoking.
The Indian Express reported that explosives belonging to an ordnance factory were recovered from a goods wagon and returned to the factory. Officials opened an inquiry into possible negligence.
A documented handling lapse—not a confirmed terror plot—shows why goods-yard checks also matter.
Dates above describe the incident or reporting period; publication dates appear beside each source. These reports motivate the problem. They do not validate BareMetal’s detection capability or establish guilt.
Explore each stage of the proposed pipeline.
The system supports trained personnel.
THz sensing captures selected spectral features. A VOC sensor array captures a complementary chemical response. Temperature, humidity and scan quality provide context.
The selected sensor hardware and operating band still need to be specified and tested.
Choose an illustrative evidence pattern and see why an uncertainty-aware system keeps an Unknown outcome.
Scripted teaching examples—not a detector, trained model, measured result or validation simulation.
Choose a pattern, then play it through the four stages.
Ready · play the walkthrough or advance one step at a time.
Play a scenario to see how the evidence is interpreted.
Evidence arrives in stages. No real sensor is connected.
From the detachable sensing core to the proposed screening workflow—watch the explanation and simulation.
Starts muted when visible. Enable sound for the explanation.
Proposed enclosure concepts · Blue identifies the shared detachable sensing core. Final dimensions and sensor packaging remain under development.
Proposed quadruped deployment for patrol coverage across coaches, platforms and yards. Mobility, vibration and power requirements need separate validation.
MOVING COVERAGEThe same sensing core in an enclosure for targeted checks by trained RPF personnel. Weight, ergonomics and scan repeatability are engineering priorities.
TARGETED CHECKSRepeated screening at selected locations. Installation geometry, power and maintenance determine where this mode is practical.
REPEATED OBSERVATIONIf the robot is unavailable, the core still has a role.
Start with the science, then explore the measurements and system choices.
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The deck defines an architecture. It does not yet establish field accuracy, a final bill of materials, battery life or deployment readiness.
Select modules, establish repeatable measurements and characterise environmental effects through an institution-led testing programme.
Compare individual sensors with the combined model on held-out data. Track false alerts, missed detections and Unknown rates.
Measure latency, power, weight, mounting repeatability and offline logging. Validate the handheld core before expanding robot integration.
Evaluate with railway and institutional partners under approved procedures. Record performance in realistic operating conditions and refine the operator workflow.
Indian Railways → Public infrastructure → Connected screening network
Answers grounded in the proposal, including the parts that remain unresolved.
Project architecture and team details come from the supplied six-slide BareMetal submission. Research supports the sensing direction, not a claim of validated BareMetal performance.
Background on non-ionising THz imaging and chemical spectroscopy.
Why volatile organic compounds enter the air and how definitions differ by context.
Research on chemical imaging under specified experimental conditions. Results cannot be transferred to our proposed hardware.
Experimental research reporting characteristic spectral absorption. It supports studying reference signatures; it does not establish our device’s field performance.
Research on THz absorption spectra of RDX, HMX, PETN and TNT. Laboratory characterisation informs the research direction, not a universal detection claim.
Six students. One shared engineering challenge.
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