Iatia - Military Digital Phase-Imaging

Iatia is the world's leading developer of digital wavefront-imaging solutions for visualisation and measurement.

QPI PASSIVE AND COVERT DEPTH-IMAGING TECHNOLOGY

Iatia's unique globally-patented QPI technology enhances visual analysis from the microscopic to the telescopic. It enables the visualisation and measurement of invisible or hard-to-see objects – from transparent biological cells and optics of the human eye, to hidden and camouflaged objects in military and security operations – in unprecedented depth and clarity.

QPI's list of applications is continuing to expand thanks to backing from a strong development team, and customers such as GE Healthcare, Columbia University, Oxford University, the Federal Bureau of Intelligence (FBI) and the Australian Defence Force.

In its key market-segments of the life sciences, nanotechnology, ophthalmology and defence, QPI has already begun to change the way we view the world. In particular, it provides passive and covert depth-imaging for defence and homeland security applications.

PASSIVE AND COVERT TARGET-RANGING

By utilising available light or heat signatures, Iatia's technology provides a passive target-ranging system able to generate target-ranging information passively and covertly, unlike active systems, such as lasers, which are not covert.

SHAPE DETECTION (CAMOUFLAGE NEGATION)

QPI is capable of detecting the shape of camouflaged objects, regardless of their colour or brightness contrast.

QPI DEFENCE APPLICATIONS

Potential exists for other defence-related QPI applications, including:

• Imaging further in turbid media
• Enhanced discrimination for surveillance and face recognition
• Adding 3-D context to thermal and low-light imaging
• Camera / image-aberration correction

QPI ADVANTAGES

QPI extracts shape information from objects by analysing changes in transmitted or reflected light.

From images with limited colour or brightness contrast (e.g. transparent lenslets), it is possible to extract three-dimensional shape information. Furthermore, QPI provides independent, shape-based visibility even in the presence of heavy colour or brightness contrast.

QPI can provide:

• Visualisation of shape and position for discrimination, monitoring or tracking
• Quantifiable shape and position for identification, recognition and ranging
• Potential to penetrate further through obscurants such as smoke, haze, fog and foliage

QPI advantages:

• Uses ambient lighting
• Can operate covertly since no outgoing-signal is required
• Can be applied to conventional fixed or portable-imaging systems
• Provides real-time processing and presentation
• All processing is done in the digital domain, making it ideal for integration into a standard digital-processing stream

SURVEILLANCE TARGET ACQUISITION AND TRACKING

Using QPI, surveillance target acquisition and tracking discrimination can be made based on shape or position, rather than colour or brightness contrast. Shadows and other brightness artefacts are automatically excluded by QPI.

IMAGE ANALYSIS IMPROVEMENT

QPI’s shape-based approach has the capacity to improve the results of image analysis in areas such as face recognition, by providing an additional source of information that is not affected by colour or brightness contrast.

QPI DIGITAL-IMAGE PROCESSING

Conventional digital-images are captured and processed by QPI. Both the conventional and the new QPI shape-based images are suitable for subsequent digital post-processing, image enhancement, shape recognition, automated identification, etc.

Additional cameras can be used to allow target tracking in real time through areas of interest.

QPI SUCCESS

Iatia won an Australian Department of Defence, Defence Science and Technology Organisation (DSTO) Capability Technology Demonstrator (CTD) contract in June 2005 for up to $2.7 million over three years.