Application of a reconfigurable stepped frequency system to cultural heritage prospecting

A prototype of reconfigurable stepped frequency GPR system has been implemented in the framework of the research project AITECH, financed by the Puglia Region (http://www.aitechnet.com/home.html). The prototype has been realized in collaboration between the Institute for Archaeological and Monumental Heritage (IBAM-CNR), the IDS Corporation and the University of Florence, and is now part of the equipment of the Laboratory of applied geophysics to archaeology and monumental heritage (http://www.ibam.cnr.it/pdf/Persico%20in.pdf). The reconfigurability is a theoretically appealing possibility, under study thanks to the availability of this prototypal system. In particular, several case histories have been studied and other ones will be studied in the next years in order to test the reconfigurable system in several situations and under different conditions. The general aim of this work in progress is not only to assess the possibilities of the instrument but also to identify its main limits in order to plan, possibly, the implementation of suitable modifications for the enhancement of its performances. In this papers, some results in sites of cultural interests will be shown, in comparison with the results achieved from a commercial pulsed GPR system. The emphasis is on the benefits of gathering three bands at the same time, related to the kind of anomaly and environment met in the case history at hand.