See the unseen: When airport security meets pharma packaging or how to check in on Schrödinger’s cat

00:00:03: From five-G networks to aerospace systems, from artificial intelligence to quantum technologies, from behind-the-scenes of innovations to real-world applications.

00:00:17: Welcome to Innovations Unplugged.

00:00:20: The Rode & Schwarz Technology Podcast.

00:00:25: I'm Markus Haller.

00:00:26: And I'm Inga Müller, Sientop.

00:00:29: And today we are diving into a story that's all about what you cannot see and why.

00:00:36: that might just change everything from airport security to your next antibiotics.

00:00:43: We are talking about millimeter wave imaging, a technology that's been quietly evolving and is now being used in some very unexpected and also very exciting places.

00:00:57: Joining us are two guests who know this subject inside out.

00:01:03: From Rode & Schwarz, the tech powerhouse enabling this innovation, one of our very own product managers for millimeter wave imaging.

00:01:12: Welcome Andreas von Lüseke.

00:01:14: Thank you for the invitation.

00:01:15: It's a pleasure being here.

00:01:17: And from Opio Tech, a company using this technology to close gaps in quality control in the pharmaceutical industry.

00:01:26: We welcome the co-founder of Optiotech, Kaspar Wittmar

00:01:31: Kans.

00:01:32: Yeah, hello everybody.

00:01:34: It's also a huge pleasure for me to be here.

00:01:36: I'm looking forward for the interesting conversation with you guys.

00:01:44: Andreas, quick questions.

00:01:45: How does millimeter wave technology work?

00:01:49: What is the technology behind?

00:01:51: Pretty quick.

00:01:53: pretty quick i'm not sure whether i can do that but maybe one thing i want to highlight first.

00:01:58: so we are talking about millimeter wave imaging.

00:02:01: but we're also talking about microwave imaging.

00:02:03: so in principle it's the same.

00:02:05: the only differences?

00:02:06: the microwave everybody knows from at home.

00:02:09: so microwaves work at two point four gigahertz roughly and they are intended to warm things up.

00:02:14: so We are working at a completely different frequency range.

00:02:17: We are working seventy seven or seventy two to eighty two gigahertz in our case.

00:02:22: And we are also working at a completely different power level.

00:02:25: So microwaves work at eight hundred watts to just get the food warm and get the job done quickly.

00:02:32: And we work at eight hundred microwatts.

00:02:34: So there's a difference of a factor of one million times.

00:02:37: So

00:02:37: when we are warming up our food makes sense for everyone.

00:02:41: Everyone knows that.

00:02:42: But how do we create imaging with millimeter waves.

00:02:46: Well, it's basically the same how we create radar images.

00:02:49: So you probably notice technology from the automotive industry, where you have this ADAS functionality, which allows you to follow the car in front of you.

00:02:58: So basically, the radar is transmitting a beam, which is being transported to the vehicle in front of it, is getting reflected, and then we're receiving that again.

00:03:08: So it travels at the speed of light.

00:03:10: We can just measure the time it takes for the signal to be received again.

00:03:13: And then we can calculate where that object was.

00:03:16: So with our technology, we just do this with multiple antennas from multiple angles.

00:03:20: So we as a human, we have two eyes.

00:03:23: So we see stereo.

00:03:25: Our radar, which is included in the image, for example, has a ninety six by ninety six MIMO array.

00:03:32: So so to say it has ninety six eyes.

00:03:35: And with that, we create virtual channels.

00:03:38: So we do have a lot of channels with a lot of information in order to then create that image.

00:03:43: We know the technology already from the airport security systems where we installed the two thousand security scanner worldwide this year, right?

00:03:55: It was in Japan, I guess.

00:03:58: And also we got this certification from the European Civil Aviation Conference for the walkthrough version.

00:04:07: So before people had to stop, make a pose.

00:04:11: and got scanned if there is something that should not be in the security area of our airport.

00:04:17: And now we have a walkthrough version certified for European aviation, right?

00:04:23: Next success milestone for the technology.

00:04:28: Right, so one of the challenges that you have with the walkthrough scanner is for the QPS.

00:04:32: You sort of say have an infinite amount of time to create an image because the image you're making, the object is moving.

00:04:39: So with the QPS walk, the object is moving.

00:04:41: So we have to be much quicker in our image creation process.

00:04:45: And with our technology... The question that we as engineers had was always, how fast can we get with the image creation?

00:04:54: Just figuring out, okay, where can we go?

00:04:57: Because from an engineering perspective, that's interesting for us.

00:05:00: So we now figured out that we can create up to one hundred images per second.

00:05:05: And then we were just trying to look for applications for that.

00:05:09: And that's basically how the image I was born.

00:05:12: So just out of curiosity.

00:05:18: Okay, so when we talk about... Imager is kind of the pocket version of the QPS security scanner from the airports.

00:05:29: And that's where Obviotech comes in, right?

00:05:32: So Obviotech aims to kind of revolutionize pharmaceutical and life science industries with the Roder & Schwarz millimeter wave imaging technology.

00:05:43: So Casper.

00:05:45: Let's shed some light on this.

00:05:47: What are you doing, technology known from airports and automotive industry, looking at the pharmaceutical industry?

00:05:56: Yes, so microwave imaging can be a game changer for non-destructive testing in the pharma industry.

00:06:05: Microwave imaging can detect hidden structural anomalies within sealed packages.

00:06:13: like foreign objects, missing objects, wrong-placed objects, things like that, even when they're embedded or packed in complex multi-layer packages.

00:06:24: This is still fascinating how deep you can look inside a structure you would never see with another technology.

00:06:33: So that's something which traditional inspection system completely missed today.

00:06:39: What exactly

00:06:40: is

00:06:41: the pharma industry looking for inspection-wise?

00:06:44: What do they want to inspect and why is a millimeter wave?

00:06:49: the best answer for this.

00:06:50: In a packaging process you must imagine when different elements come to a packaging line then maybe as it starts with a blister first and then in these blisters then the next thing maybe comes a needle-in or a wire-in and then a booklet and then another piece and every step from this filling process is normally inspected by a camera.

00:07:15: This goes along the packaging line and one at the end of this packaging line.

00:07:22: it needs to be wrapped into a box.

00:07:24: normally it's a. it's a cardboard box with different different sizes all different sizes and when it goes into this box these are different technologies or processes.

00:07:35: it can be loaded from the top it can be loaded from the side and it's closed.

00:07:40: it's then sleeved there comes some prints on it and From this moment on, you cannot check anymore what's inside.

00:07:48: And there is still a rest risk, I would say, that something can happen during this final step of wrapping a product.

00:08:00: And I always say, when you see all the efforts they do before, the billions they invested in the product, but they fail then in the end, or they leave out the last really step.

00:08:12: to check in the end of this this complex long process to make an image or to generate an image of the full package.

00:08:24: This is something we would like to take.

00:08:27: So the drug itself costs a lot of money.

00:08:30: So we're talking about a couple of thousand euros each.

00:08:32: The packaging.

00:08:34: costs very little.

00:08:34: so we may be talking about a few cents to a couple of euros but if you mess up with these couple of euros all the thousands that you invested in this medication is basically not worth it because the packaging is not holding it.

00:08:46: That's

00:08:47: where I would like to challenge the existing processes because doing a very hundred percent check in the end this is more than useful or more makes a lot of sense when you see all the billions invested before because you need to see when the package is wrapped and sealed.

00:09:08: It's a product who goes into the world so it's maybe then stabbled in a bigger box and then it goes out and nobody from Pharma is touching it.

00:09:19: anymore.

00:09:20: It's the last point, it's the last moment, the last frontier to the world, to the patient.

00:09:25: And so therefore I think it makes a lot of sense to invest there in a new test method to really get an image of the full packaged content.

00:09:37: So the basic idea is have a one hundred percent check and offline of the production process which does not exist right now.

00:09:47: and the idea would be We have millimeter wave imaging technology that works quite good at airports and in automotive.

00:09:56: Why not implement this additional checking for the pharma industry?

00:10:05: I'm quite traveling a lot.

00:10:07: I'm meeting a lot of pharma companies, meeting a lot of pharma equipment manufacturers and they all see this positive.

00:10:18: They see the effect or see the positive effect of such a hundred percent end of line test.

00:10:24: It could become a new testing standard.

00:10:28: And what that means is massive.

00:10:30: I mean, you can imagine if the regulatory bodies like FDA or EMA are telling the industry.

00:10:39: that you need to adapt, you need to integrate a final inspection, a hundred percent inspection end of line, that would be a massive boost.

00:10:52: Coming from the traditional way kind of, we've got cameras technology-wise, we have got scales, we've got x-rays in use at the very end.

00:11:06: Are we missing something?

00:11:08: Digital cameras along the full process are in service.

00:11:13: That's clear.

00:11:14: Checkways also, they're doing their job.

00:11:17: X-ray systems, this is maybe something that is a little bit of a misconception.

00:11:23: This is not really working in pharma.

00:11:26: Why?

00:11:29: They are used in food.

00:11:30: They're used in consumer goods.

00:11:33: That's all good.

00:11:34: But when it comes to... pharmaceutical products, especially to biologic products, protein-based products, monoclonal antibodies are called or RNA-based therapies.

00:11:48: They are super sensitive to environmental conditions.

00:11:53: So you cannot treat them with X-ray waves or X-ray radiation because they could start to change their bindings, you know, and this is something that's absolutely no go.

00:12:09: So

00:12:09: the biggest advantage of the millimeter waves here is actually that it's non-intrusive.

00:12:14: So it doesn't destroy anything and doesn't alter anything.

00:12:17: And also we don't, we shouldn't forget that x-ray is highly energetic.

00:12:21: So there's just stuff that it just penetrates.

00:12:23: So it penetrates the skin.

00:12:24: If you want to see alterations on the skin, you will not be able to do so with x-ray because the energy level is just way too high.

00:12:31: And therefore, exactly therefore, we believe so much in a technology that is based on gigahertz on millimeter wave technology from you guys.

00:12:40: So this is very interesting and it's completely new in the industry.

00:12:43: We talked about limitations from the traditional control systems.

00:12:47: Do we have limitations for millimeter wave imaging?

00:12:51: So we're talking about packaging.

00:12:53: Is there anything we cannot look through even with millimeter waves?

00:12:57: There is, unfortunately, to every system.

00:13:00: There's physical limitations.

00:13:02: So our limitations are everything that is wet or has a too high water content.

00:13:09: We cannot penetrate.

00:13:10: Why?

00:13:12: Because the reflectivity of the water is quite high.

00:13:15: So we can't really look into that.

00:13:16: So we can see the outer structure of stuff.

00:13:20: of liquid water.

00:13:22: but we can't look into liquid water.

00:13:24: so it's a different thing with frozen water.

00:13:26: So frozen water we can at least partially penetrate.

00:13:31: so we could also illuminate frozen things and analyze those.

00:13:36: but what is definitely a no-go where we cannot penetrate is metal.

00:13:41: Questioning if it's possible to detect foreign particles in liquids.

00:13:47: which are in metal cans.

00:13:49: So this is a challenge we cannot tackle because it's a liquid and it's a metal.

00:13:54: So there's nothing that we see, we will only see the can.

00:13:57: When it comes to limitations, I mean the good thing is, Andrea said, corruptly correctly, metal.

00:14:03: I must say sometimes these materials also help a little bit to see things.

00:14:09: also because you have then all the different signals you collect again.

00:14:14: You have sometimes a needle.

00:14:15: or a plastic syringe, you have maybe a metallic item.

00:14:20: This even gives also an interesting signal that can be collected and also generates an information for the image, which is quite nice.

00:14:28: We had a customer requesting us to detect whether the leaflet is present in the package.

00:14:33: So the leaflet creates a shadow.

00:14:37: on the metallic surface of the pill blister.

00:14:39: So you can create an image of the metallic surface of the pill blister and then detect the shadow of the leaflet and therefore decide with this face information on the metal that you cannot penetrate whether the leaflet is there or not.

00:14:52: So just we can't penetrate things, doesn't mean we don't see things.

00:15:02: First images in the pharma industry were pretty challenging as you named it.

00:15:10: Is AI something that could like support this or that be a solution for this problem.

00:15:18: AI is certainly very helpful in this regards because in even very blurry images, it can still detect things that human eyes cannot detect.

00:15:26: But I think what was actually like?

00:15:28: a real improvement of the image quality that we did.

00:15:32: So the first we call it the single cluster because it only contained one cluster.

00:15:37: And this had a limited imaging size of about fifteen by fifteen centimeter.

00:15:42: So what we did is same as with the satellite imaging where the satellite moves around the earth to improve the image quality.

00:15:51: What we do instead of moving the satellite is so to say moving the earth.

00:15:55: We move the device under test on a conveyor belt which is happening in production anyway, because everything is working on a conveyor belt.

00:16:03: And we take multiple images, combine these multiple images.

00:16:06: And with this approach called ISA, it's inverse synthetic aperture radar, we can tremendously improve the image quality.

00:16:14: And I think still it would help to have like, making the imaging faster.

00:16:19: You named that the Coupier also became faster when we created the walkthrough or engineered the walkthrough scanner.

00:16:26: I think that adds on that.

00:16:28: It definitely does, because if you use that ISA approach, the more images you can add on top, the better the image quality gets.

00:16:36: Speed is an important topic, jumping in here.

00:16:39: I mean, we talk about solutions in pharma, in production, or in packaging.

00:16:46: Then you need to match, of course, existing speed lines or process speeds.

00:16:52: You cannot integrate, of course, a new technology when you do not match the speed.

00:16:57: you can imagine you cannot say okay we see everything inside but you need to slow down fifty percent the line.

00:17:04: then you can imagine what happens and no chance.

00:17:06: so that was one of the challenges we had and that's we really had a great cooperation with the team from Rodion Schwartz we really could enhance the build quality, the reconstruction quality, the speed is today, we can say that we can measure packages, complex packages, packages in former up to hundred sixty packages per minute I would say today.

00:17:34: This is quite a high number and this fits to the standards.

00:17:39: in in packaging line of complex project complex Combination products in former.

00:17:45: so that's a great achievement.

00:17:47: if you are interested in more how it works and you also want to see how it works Andreas has made a very nice video and we will put the link to it in our show notes for you.

00:17:59: Casper we have with millimeter wave imaging a technology that is has been proven successful in automotive and in airports.

00:18:11: Is

00:18:12: this kind of a challenge because those industries are very different than pharma or is it more a benefit because there are some similarities?

00:18:24: Well, I would say the similarity is also that both industries you mentioned have strong regulations.

00:18:31: We can learn from These two other industries that you need a system that is extremely as a system and a technology that is very stable to be successful in these industries.

00:18:43: And that's I think that's that was my main motivation to to look into this body scanner microwave immature module because this is something that's stable.

00:18:56: It's in the market.

00:18:57: It runs as a service model around it.

00:19:00: So it's it's something that gives you a certain industry readiness and stability and robustness.

00:19:10: That's the base engine for the solution

00:19:12: we built.

00:19:21: We could have said, OK, we do have a success story here.

00:19:24: We do have the security scanners.

00:19:26: It's working.

00:19:27: We are selling.

00:19:28: so far so good.

00:19:31: But we are looking at new applications.

00:19:33: We are looking at other industries, at diverse industries, as we just heard.

00:19:38: Why?

00:19:40: Because that's what is driving us as engineers.

00:19:43: I mean, we're curious.

00:19:43: You want to know what our technology can do.

00:19:46: We're also trying to figure out what are potential applications in the food and beverage industry.

00:19:51: We're also looking for potential applications in the logistic industry.

00:19:55: And I mean, partly the challenges are the same because also in logistics, things are moving quite fast.

00:20:00: So we're talking about conveyor speeds of one, one point five meters a second and This is a challenge for us.

00:20:06: And that was also the reason why we tried to get every possible frame out of the system that we can get.

00:20:13: We wanted to get as fast as possible.

00:20:15: And there's a lot of changes, a lot of challenges that we haven't solved yet, but that's what is driving us.

00:20:21: So we want to see what we can do.

00:20:23: So the walkthrough is evolving to a run-through?

00:20:27: That's actually the case because there's customers that say the walkthrough isn't fast enough and we have the maximum walking speed and that's not sufficient for the applications.

00:20:36: So we have developed a new software, new hardware options, which increase the maximum walking speed.

00:20:42: So yeah, probably at one point in time we will reach the run-through detector.

00:20:48: That's a nice perspective.

00:20:50: So you already gave some examples, Andreas, about other industries where this technology could also be of a benefit.

00:20:58: Why is that maybe critical in other industries too?

00:21:02: So it really can be all over the place because what we only do is create images.

00:21:07: And the cool thing is that these images are super easy to interpret.

00:21:11: So we one day had a customer who was sending us glasses from a submarine.

00:21:16: and he wanted to detect air enclosures in these glasses.

00:21:19: So this was a challenge because the glass is very thick and with the thick glass we have defocusing of the rays.

00:21:26: So we developed a special software which actually recalculates or calculates the defocusing out and we get a clear and good signal in the end.

00:21:38: We didn't really make this an application because it didn't work the way we expected it and the way the customer would have expected it.

00:21:45: But we used the software that we created for this application in different applications done, where the layer that we had to look through and the deep focusing was not that much.

00:21:55: That is not something I use daily, but a good example for what the technology can cover, right?

00:22:07: Before we come to the close of this episode for today,

00:22:11: a

00:22:12: quick personal question for the both of you.

00:22:14: What excites you most when you think about what comes next, what is going on?

00:22:20: So the cool thing is that this is a really new and emerging technology.

00:22:24: So basically, there's very few people on this planet who currently see these kind of images.

00:22:30: And basically, if a customer brings a new sample, I'm more or less the first person in the world to see the millimeter-wave image of that exact sample.

00:22:38: And that excites me.

00:22:40: Thank you for sharing, Andreas.

00:22:41: Kaster,

00:22:42: what about you?

00:22:43: I can jump on this.

00:22:45: It's a little bit similar to what Andreas said.

00:22:47: For me, it's when I show an image of a package or from a drug package, whatever, to a person who comes from this industry.

00:23:00: First reaction is always.

00:23:01: Oh nice.

00:23:02: You can look inside.

00:23:03: It's x-ray.

00:23:04: That's the first reaction always.

00:23:06: And then I must say, no, it's not x-ray.

00:23:09: It's something else.

00:23:10: What is this?

00:23:11: And I say, yeah, it's gigahertz, microwave technology.

00:23:15: And this is really exciting.

00:23:16: That shows that we are doing something very interesting.

00:23:19: We are at the forefront of something.

00:23:21: And yeah, I'm looking forward to the future.

00:23:24: Thank you very much for sharing.

00:23:26: I find it very exciting myself listening to you guys, hearing about a very mature technology from Rode and Schwarz, evolving to different industries, transferring to other applications.

00:23:42: As Andreas just said, this is us.

00:23:45: This is engineering at Rode and Schwarz.

00:23:47: Many thanks to our guests.

00:23:49: Many thanks to Andreas and Kaspar for all these insights and interesting stories.

00:23:56: Yeah, I would like to thank you all here.

00:23:58: It was a very interesting conversation.

00:24:01: Yeah, thanks a lot for the chance of being here.

00:24:04: And if you have more interest in Earth, you can learn a lot about mini-meter wave technology online as well.

00:24:11: So visit rode-schwarz.com.

00:24:16: And if you're curious about more tech that's changing the way we live, make sure to subscribe to this podcast.