Apparatus for the measurement of ore in mine haul vehicles is disclosed, the apparatus comprising: a portal, defining a portal zone, wherein a haul vehicle carrying ore is positionable in or movable through the portal zone; and at least one magnetic resonance (MR) sensor comprised in the portal. The MR sensor includes a main loop and a drive loop located above the main loop. A magnetic resonance sensor control system is provided and configured to control at least one of: the positioning of the at least one MR sensor relative to the portal zone and/or ore burden; the positioning of elements comprised in the MR sensor relative to each other; electromagnetic suppression characteristics of the at least one MR sensor; and/or sensitivity of the at least one MR sensor as a function of distance of the sensor from the ore burden.

Systems and methods for locating a substance of interest below the Earth's surface are provided. One embodiment generates a downward directed magnetic pulse using a magnetic field pulse generator, wherein phonon energy is emitted by a plurality of nuclei in response to precession induced into the plurality of nuclei by the magnetic field pulse; detecting the phonon energy with at least one acoustic transducer; communicating a signal corresponding to the detected phonon energy from at least one acoustic transducer to a controller system; analyzing a frequency domain of the signal corresponding to the detected phonon energy at the controller system; comparing the analyzed frequency domain of the signal with the phonon response frequency for the plurality of different substances at the controller system; and identifying a substance when the compared analyzed frequency domain of the signal matches the phonon response frequency for one of the plurality of different substances.

A magnetic resonance detection (MRD) system for and methods of detecting and classifying multiple chemical substances is disclosed. In one example, the presently disclosed MRD system is a nuclear quadrupole resonance (NQR) detection system that provides multi-frequency operation for substantially full coverage of the explosive NQR spectrum using a broadband transmit/receive (T/R) switch (or duplexer) and a single multi-frequency radio frequency (RF) transducer. More particularly, the MRD system provides a frequency-agile system that can operate over a wide band of frequencies or wavelengths. Further, a method of detecting and classifying various chemical substances is provided that includes pulse sequencing with “frequency hopping,” phase cycling for reducing or substantially eliminating background noise, and/or a process of mitigating amplitude modulation (AM) radio interference.

Apparatus for the measurement of ore in mine ore benches or ore stockpiles is disclosed, the apparatus comprising: a mobile platform, defining a platform zone, wherein the mobile platform is positionable on or above a mine ore bench or stockpile; and at least one magnetic resonance (MR) sensor comprised in the mobile platform. The MR sensor includes a main loop and a drive loop located above the main loop. A magnetic resonance sensor control system is provided and configured to control at least one of: the positioning of the at least one MR sensor relative to the platform zone and/or mine ore bench or ore stockpile; the positioning of elements comprised in the MR sensor relative to each other; electromagnetic suppression characteristics of the at least one MR sensor; and/or sensitivity of the at least one MR sensor as a function of distance of the sensor from the mine ore bench or ore stockpile.

Portable electronic devices may be inspected for the presence of explosives using a combination of nuclear quadrupole resonance (NQR) and explosive trace detection (ETD). NQR may be used to detect bulk or sheet explosives while the ETD may be used to detect minute quantities of explosive particulates. An alarm indication may be generated when either the NQR spectroscopy or the ETD detects an explosive material.

Explosives concealed within electronic devices, such as smartphones and tablet PCs, are detected using NQR spectroscopy. For example, a suspect electronic device can be placed inside a NQR scanner and be subject to interrogation electromagnetic radiation at varying frequencies. The electronic device is exposed to interrogation electromagnetic radiation at frequencies that correspond to chemical components of various explosives. In the event that an explosive chemical component is present inside the electronic device, irradiating the electronic device with interrogation electromagnetic radiation at the specific NQR frequency of that explosive chemical component will cause the explosive chemical component to emit feedback electromagnetic radiation at that frequency. Consequently, the NQR scanner can measure the feedback electromagnetic radiation and determine that the frequency of the feedback electromagnetic radiation indicates the presence of the explosive chemical component inside the electronic device.

A method of authenticating an article, the method comprising: reading a label associated with the article, the label comprising article fingerprint information; retrieving, in dependence on the article fingerprint information, an article fingerprint, the fingerprint describing the resonance response of the article to an excitation signal; applying an excitation signal to the article; receiving the resonance response of the article to the excitation signal; comparing the resonance response to the fingerprint; and determining in dependence on the comparison whether the article is authentic.

An antenna system is provided comprising first, second, and third loop antennas, each antenna having a respective loop area and spaced apart from the other antennas. The first and third antennas are configured and driven to form a first independent balanced feed point that is substantially isolated from the second antenna, which is configured to be driven from a second balanced feed point. A sum of the first and second respective loop areas, at a sum port in operable communication with the first and second balanced feed points, is substantially equivalent to the third respective loop area. An automatic control system is configured to automatically and independently adjust, via the balanced feed points, at least one of amplitude and phase for at least one of the three loop antennas, to help to substantially maximize suppression of RFI for a sum of signals from the first and second balanced feed points.

A method is offered which permits NMR measurements of integer spin nuclei to be performed at higher sensitivity than heretofore. In particular, the method enables high-resolution multidimensional correlation NMR measurements on integer spin nucleus S having integer spin S and nucleus I of other spin species. The method starts with applying an RF magnetic field having a frequency that is n times (where n is an integer equal to or greater than 2) the Larmor frequency of the integer spin nucleus S to the spin S. Magnetization transfer is effected between the nucleus I and the integer spin nucleus S.

An exemplary integrated nuclear quadrupole resonance-based detection system comprises a front-end device having a hand-held form factor, wherein the front-end device is configured to scan a sample in or near a sample coil using inbuild electronics and acquire a nuclear quadrupole resonance measurement. The system further includes a swappable sample coil that is attached to an opening at a face of the front-end device and is tuned to a resonant frequency of the sample; and a swappable impedance matching network that is attached to the opening at the face of the front-end device and is configured to tune the resonant frequency of the sample coil. The inbuild electronics comprises a wireless transfer module that is configured to communicate the acquired nuclear quadrupole resonance measurement with a back-end device of the integrated nuclear quadrupole resonance-based detection system. Other systems and methods are also provided.