According to the National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA), in 2022, Fentanyl overdose was responsible for the deaths of roughly 80,000 Americans; and that number has been rapidly growing due to increasing amounts of fentanyl smuggled illegally across the US border each year. Fentanyl is a type of synthetic opioid with over 50 times the potency of heroin and over 100 times the potency of morphine. In fact, the Drug Enforcement Administration(DEA) indicates that only 2 milligrams of Fentanyl can serve to be a lethal dose. Its cheap production costs coupled with high toxicity has made it a common component of counterfeit pills. Fentanyl is also found in various street drug samples as a cutting agent for other drugs such as heroin or cocaine. In this way, many fentanyl overdoses can end up being accidental. NIDA highlights that Fentanyl overdose has taken more lives compared to any other drug, making it the center of a national drug health crisis. The fight to keep fentanyl out of American lives starts with preventing illegal fentanyl entry into the US. In recent years, border security has confiscated upwards of 22,000 lbs of fentanyl at the Southwest border alone(DEA). Despite this number being quite large, a lot of Fentanyl continues to go undetected. My project will explore advanced chemical analysis techniques that can be used to detect Fentanyl with a higher accuracy and precision in hopes of evaluating possible improvements in fentanyl detection. The MITRE Corporation is currently working on developing their own advanced sensing technologies in this field. My internship with them provides me with first hand experience with the process of developing an effective drug detection technology. This on-site experience coupled with my independent study/review of spectroscopy techniques in the field of drug detection will allow me to ultimately conclude on the ways we can improve detection for Fentanyl, and potentially other harmful drugs, in the future.