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OGDEN — Weber State University graduate student Gavin Messerly is harnessing his engineering expertise to develop a technology that appeals to both military personnel at Hill Air Force Base and WSU researchers studying the Great Salt Lake.
Messerly, who earned a bachelor's degree in computer engineering at WSU in 2023 and is now a project lead in the 309th Software Engineering Group at Hill Air Force Base, is testing a new kind of ground-penetrating radar.
This technology will use software-defined radio to generate high-resolution images used to see objects underground.
"Ground-penetrating radar, as the name implies, is supposed to be radar that is designed to see subsurface objects, or discontinuities, or basically just to look at things underground," Messerly said.
The problem with most ground-penetrating radar systems, Messerly said, is the sheer size of the technology.
Usually, the units are either like pushcarts — Messerly said to imagine a lawn mower with antennas — or handheld, metal detectoresque machines.
"(Ground-penetrating radar) has been around since, like, the 1920s," Messerly said. "Scanning areas with (Ground-penetrating radars) can take a long time. There's been a lot of interest in drone-based (ground-penetrating radar) — or attaching a (ground-penetrating radar) onto a small, flying drone to be able to take surveys to speed up this process."
Of course, the thought of making a hulking ground-penetrating radar unit work with a lightweight drone doesn't exactly seem feasible. This is where Messerly's work comes in.
"We want to develop a more affordable and open-source (ground-penetrating radar) unit," Messerly said. "Radios are cheaper, they use less power and they're a lot lighter than traditional radar units, so we're asking: How good of a (ground-penetrating radar) unit can we create out of a radio? They're more feasible for drone use because a smaller drone can carry them, and you can get more flight time because they use less power."
The new twist on ground-penetrating radar technology could serve two purposes: Military personnel in the explosive ordnance disposal career field are interested in using ground-penetrating radar to detect buried landmines, while researchers at Weber State aim to study subsurface organisms around the Great Salt Lake.
Messerly sees his research as "killing two birds with one stone," exploring technological advancements that would be useful to the military and academia alike.
It's also serving as his capstone project for his master's degree, with his research backed by Christian Hearn and Tye Gardner, professors in Weber State's Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering and supported by the 309th Software Engineering Group through an educational partnership agreement between the university and Hill Air Force Base.
Messerly's research proposal was approved last month, and he'll continue working on the project for at least the next year.
"Radar has always been something that has just fascinated me — being able to detect objects that you can't see is just a cool concept in general," he said.
The end goal, outside the scope of Messerly's capstone project, would be to lay the foundation for lighter, drone-based ground-penetrating radar units, which could fly over landscapes and identify underground objects from afar.
As far as next steps for Messerly, he's focused on graduating with his master's degree in December 2025 and plans to continue working at Hill Air Force Base afterward.
But that doesn't mean he isn't thinking, at least a little bit, about how his research could impact ground-penetrating radar down the road.
"This type of technology can definitely be extended to more than just ground-penetrating radar. Traditional radar units that are trying to detect objects that aren't subsurface ... (software-defined radio) has shown some promise in that field, but there's still a significant amount of research that needs to be done in that, specifically, because the power output isn't usually large enough on (software-defined radios) to be able to be used for that kind of application right now."
For now, though, Messerly is just focused on getting a ground-penetrating radar working with radio. The next step is actually putting it onto a drone and testing it.
"That's the immediate next step for this project ... the actual drone implementation," Messerly said.
