DETECTION OF RANDOMLY BURIED TARGETS USING GROUND PENETRATING RADAR WITH VARIABLE GRID-SPACING

Ground-penetrating radar (GPR) is one of the commonly used geophysical tools in detecting shallow targets. In this study, we compared two different GPR datasets in order to locate randomly buried targets. In both cases, data were acquired over an area of 52m-by-52m with grid sizes of 4m-by-4m and 2m-by-2m respectively, at the East Tennessee Agricultural Research and Education Center, University of Tennessee.

Data were acquired using the GSSI SIR 4000 system. Further processing and modeling of the raw data was carried out using RADAN 7. A total of 25 objects of varying dimensions and materials were buried at different depths between 0.3m and 1.5m. Results indicate that most of the targets were resolved from both datasets with varying resolution, as expected. Data from 4m-by-4m grid spacing show a general trend of the anomalous zones, although the anomalies were not clearly located. Whereas the data from 2m-by-2m grid better represents the anomalies spatially.

Our study suggests that a larger grid spacing can still be able to detect anomalous trends related to the targets with appropriate parameterization, acquisition and processing of the data as compared to the data acquired using smaller grids. A quicker reconnaissance using larger grid spacing over an area can sufficiently enhance the feasibility of further GPR investigations.