An explosive is a reactive substance that contains a great amount of potential energy that can produce an explosion if released suddenly, usually accompanied by the production of light, heat, sound, and pressure. An explosive charge is a measured quantity of explosive material, which may either be composed solely of one ingredient or be a mixture containing at least two substances.
Semtex is a general-purpose plastic explosive containing RDX and PETN. It is used in commercial blasting, demolition, and in certain military applications.
Trinitrotoluene, more commonly known as TNT, more specifically 2,4,6-trinitrotoluene, and by its preferred IUPAC name 2-methyl-1,3,5-trinitrobenzene, is a chemical compound with the formula C6H2(NO2)3CH3. TNT is occasionally used as a reagent in chemical synthesis, but it is best known as an explosive material with convenient handling properties. The explosive yield of TNT is considered to be the standard comparative convention of bombs and asteroid impacts. In chemistry, TNT is used to generate charge transfer salts.
Pentaerythritol tetranitrate (PETN), also known as PENT, PENTA, TEN, corpent, or penthrite, is an explosive material. It is the nitrate ester of pentaerythritol, and is structurally very similar to nitroglycerin. Penta refers to the five carbon atoms of the neopentane skeleton. PETN is a very powerful explosive material with a relative effectiveness factor of 1.66. When mixed with a plasticizer, PETN forms a plastic explosive. Along with RDX it is the main ingredient of Semtex.
Authentication is the act of proving an assertion, such as the identity of a computer system user. In contrast with identification, the act of indicating a person or thing's identity, authentication is the process of verifying that identity. It might involve validating personal identity documents, verifying the authenticity of a website with a digital certificate, determining the age of an artifact by carbon dating, or ensuring that a product or document is not counterfeit.
C-4 or Composition C-4 is a common variety of the plastic explosive family known as Composition C, which uses RDX as its explosive agent. C-4 is composed of explosives, plastic binder, plasticizer to make it malleable, and usually a marker or odorizing taggant chemical. C-4 has a texture similar to modelling clay and can be molded into any desired shape. C-4 is metastable and can be detonated only by the shock wave from a detonator or blasting cap.
Packaging is the science, art and technology of enclosing or protecting products for distribution, storage, sale, and use. Packaging also refers to the process of designing, evaluating, and producing packages. Packaging can be described as a coordinated system of preparing goods for transport, warehousing, logistics, sale, and end use. Packaging contains, protects, preserves, transports, informs, and sells. In many countries it is fully integrated into government, business, institutional, industrial, and personal use.
Acetone peroxide is an organic peroxide and a primary explosive. It is produced by the reaction of acetone and hydrogen peroxide to yield a mixture of linear monomer and cyclic dimer, trimer, and tetramer forms. The dimer is known as diacetone diperoxide (DADP). The trimer is known as triacetone triperoxide (TATP) or tri-cyclic acetone peroxide (TCAP). Acetone peroxide takes the form of a white crystalline powder with a distinctive bleach-like odor or a fruit-like smell when pure, and can explode powerfully if subjected to heat, friction, static electricity, concentrated sulfuric acid, strong UV radiation or shock. Until about 2015, explosives detectors were not set to detect non-nitrogenous based explosives, as most explosives used preceding 2015 were nitrogen-based. TATP, being nitrogen-free, has been used as the explosive of choice in several terrorist bomb attacks since 2001.
Security printing is the field of the printing industry that deals with the printing of items such as banknotes, cheques, passports, tamper-evident labels, security tapes, product authentication, stock certificates, postage stamps and identity cards. The main goal of security printing is to prevent forgery, tampering, or counterfeiting. More recently many of the techniques used to protect these high-value documents have become more available to commercial printers, whether they are using the more traditional offset and flexographic presses or the newer digital platforms. Businesses are protecting their lesser-value documents such as transcripts, coupons and prescription pads by incorporating some of the features listed below to ensure that they cannot be forged or that alteration of the data cannot occur undetected.
The Composition C family is a family of related US-specified plastic explosives consisting primarily of RDX. All can be moulded by hand for use in demolition work and packed by hand into shaped charge devices. Variants have different proportions and plasticisers and include composition C-2, composition C-3, and composition C-4.
Explosive detection is a non-destructive inspection process to determine whether a container contains explosive material. Explosive detection is commonly used at airports, ports and for border control.
Mononitrotoluene, or methylnitrobenzene or nitrotoluene (MNT or NT), is a group of three organic compounds, a nitro derivative of toluene (or alternatively a methyl derivative of nitrobenzene). Its chemical formula is C6H4(CH3)(NO2).
High Energy Materials Research Laboratory (HEMRL) is a laboratory of the Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO). Located in Pune, its main function is the research and development of technologies and products in the area of High Energy Materials and Explosive materials. HEMRL is organised under the Armaments Directorate of DRDO. The Ex. director of HEMRL was Late Bikash Bhattacharya.
The U.S. Army Edgewood Chemical Biological Center (ECBC) is the United States's principal research and development resource for non-medical chemical and biological (CB) defense. As a critical national asset in the CB defense community, ECBC supports all phases of the acquisition life-cycle ― from basic and applied research through technology development, engineering design, equipment evaluation, product support, sustainment, field operations and demilitarization ― to address its customers’ unique requirements.
A counterfeit medication or a counterfeit drug is a medication or pharmaceutical item which is produced and sold with the intent to deceptively represent its origin, authenticity, or effectiveness. A counterfeit drug may contain inappropriate quantities of active ingredients, or none, may be improperly processed within the body, may contain ingredients that are not on the label, or may be supplied with inaccurate or fake packaging and labeling. Counterfeit drugs are related to pharma fraud. Drug manufacturers and distributors are increasingly investing in countermeasures, such as traceability and authentication technologies, to try to minimise the impact of counterfeit drugs. Antibiotics with insufficient quantities of an active ingredient add to the problem of antibiotic resistance.
Counterfeit consumer goods are goods, often of inferior quality, made or sold under another's brand name without the brand owner's authorization. Sellers of such goods may infringe on either the trademark, patent or copyright of the brand owner by passing off its goods as made by the brand owner. Counterfeit products made up 5 to 7% of world trade in 2013, and in 2014 cost an estimated 2.5 million jobs worldwide, with up to 750,000 jobs lost in the U.S. About 5% of goods imported into the European Union in 2013 were fakes, according to the OECD.
Brand protection is the process and set of actions that a right holder undertakes to prevent third parties from using its intellectual property without permission, as this may cause loss of revenue and, usually more importantly, destroys brand equity, reputation and trust. Brand protection seeks primarily to ensure that trademarks, patents, and copyrights are respected, though other intellectual property rights such as industrial design rights or trade dress can be involved. Counterfeiting is the umbrella term to designate infringements to intellectual property, with the exception of the term piracy which is sometimes (colloquially) used to refer to copyright infringement.
Pharmaceutical packaging is the packages and the packaging processes for pharmaceutical preparations. It involves all of the operations from production through drug distribution channels to the end consumer.
A copy detection pattern (CDP) or graphical code is a small random or pseudo-random digital image which is printed on documents, labels or products for counterfeit detection. Authentication is made by scanning the printed CDP using an image scanner or mobile phone camera. It is possible to store additional product-specific data into the CDP that will be decoded during the scanning process. A CDP can also be inserted into a 2D barcode to facilitate smartphone authentication and to connect with traceability data.
Lorne Elias is a Canadian chemist, inventor, and a pioneer in explosives detection technology. He invented the explosives vapour detector, EVD-1, a portable bomb detection instrument deployed at international airports in Canada in the 1980s. He contributed to the field of explosives detection for over three decades, and is called the father of vapour and trace explosives detection technology.
