  The use of conventional imaging techniques becomes problematic when faced
with challenging logistics and confined environments. In particular, such
scenarios are not unusual in the field of archaeological and mining
explorations as well as for nuclear waste characterization. For these
applications, even the use of muography is complicated since the detectors have
to be deployed in difficult areas with limited room for instrumentation, e.g.,
narrow tunnels. To address this limitation, we have developed a portable muon
detector (muoscope) based on glass Resistive Plate Chambers (RPC) with an
active area of 16 $\times$ 16 cm$^{2}$. The specific design goals taken into
consideration while developing our first prototype are portability, robustness,
autonomy, versatility, safety and low cost. To help further improve our design
goals, we are currently studying the possibility to switch the sensitive units
from strips in the old prototype to pixels for the new one However, for
performing high resolution muography, the number of readout units per layer
will also need to increase significantly, leading to increase in the overall
cost and power consumption of the muoscope. To mitigate these issues, we are
developing a novel 2D multiplexing algorithm for reading out several pixels
with a single electronic channel. In this article, we give an overview of the
detector development, focusing mainly on the design goals and the choice of
detector technology. Furthermore, we present the details of the expected
changes in the new prototype as well as a simulated 2D multiplexing study based
on general principles.
