Active Denial Technology refers to the act of emitting a focused beam of millimeter waves that results in the unbearable sensation of pain within an individual’s skin. Test subjects of the technology refer to the feeling as if their skin is immediately placed into a frying pan. The end result of the employment of active denial technology is to repel an individual or group of people with minimum risk of injury to the affected person(s). The United States Marine Corps has led the United States Government’s efforts in the development of Active Denial Technology through the Joint Non-Lethal Weapons Directorate in order to help minimize fatalities and limit collateral damage across all types of military operations.
How Does Active Denial Technology Work?
Active Denial Technology makes use of a 95 GHz millimeter-wave directed energy. When the microwave blast encounters a human subject, it will penetrate approximately 1/64th of an inch into the bodies skin. Once a body is illuminated by the beam, the body feels an extreme sense of pain caused by the water in the body’s skin being heated by the microwaves. The sensation persists until the person moves out of range of the beam or it is turned off. Due to the shallow penetration into the body and normal human instinctive reactions, there is minimal risk of permanent damage, however, there has been conjecture on the potential for permanent eye damage resulting from the technology.
Legacy Active Denial Technology Configurations
The U.S. Government’s primary employment of Active Denial Technology is through the Active Denial System (ADS). The initial deployment of the technology was between 2002 and 2007 in a prototype used on a High Mobility Multipurpose Wheeled Vehicle, and a separate test on a tactical truck. Each of the systems were successfully fielded and tested indicating there was a less than 1/10th of 1% chance of permanent injury from the technology. After the testing was completed, the military desired a smaller and more light-weight version of the technology.
Current Work in Active Denial Technology
Current work in Active Denial Technology is focused on developing the next generation of the technology. This work has been focused on making the existing sources of millimeter waves usable with a smaller footprint of gear while also looking for new sources of microwaves to use to achieve the same effects. Concurrent research focuses on leveraging current advancements in solid-state technologies to help reduce the overall weight, size, and cost of ADS units as well as looking into the potential use of higher frequency waveforms or low power lasers.