Slashdot Mirror
Full-Body Airport Scanners Downsizing For Doctors/Dentists
An anonymous reader writes "Cheap handheld terahertz scanners that do the same thing as those big bulky full-body scanners at the airport could be in your doctor's and dentist's office soon. The Semiconductor Research Corp. has successfully sponsored chip maker Texas Instruments in making cheap CMOS chips that do the same thing as those refrigerator sized full-body scanners at the airport. The resulting handheld versions can be tuned to look inside your teeth in the dentist chair and under you skin at the doctor's office. The best part is that terahertz rays are completely safe, unlike the X-rays used today by dentists and doctors which can cause cancer. Count me in!"
I'll wait to believe terahertz radiation is "completely safe" for a little while, yet.
********* sig: If you don't like the law, get filthy stinking rich, and buy a better one.
Scanners belong in doctors' offices, not airports.
Couldn't the doctor just ask you to remove your clothes?
Didn't these used to say that X-rays were safe? Anyway, in IMHO the best option is to not to scan at all. Just let everyone board the plane and be on their way -or- we'll start scanning people boarding buses next.
If I were a dentist, I'd certainly want to know if you're packing heat before I start subjecting you to excruciating pain ;-)
As certified by the $10/hr TSA agent with barely a high school education.
Two of my imaginary friends reproduced once
I"m old enough to remember when X Rays were completely safe. They were installing them in shoe stores to check to see if your feet fit right in the shoes.
I don't want these fancy new scanners in my dentist's office! What's wrong with having the hygenist run me through the metal detector prior to performing an enhanced patdown?
Yeah we need far more testing on radiation. Especially in the 400nm to 700nm range.
Sure they say its perfectly safe but how long have we been exposing ourselves to it? More data is required!
Guess it depends on how cute your hygienist is.
Monstar L
You are probably familiar with the usual laser safety warning:
Do not look into the laser with your remaining eye.
Obviously light in that wavelength range is problematic.
the scanner is combined with Google Glass and dirty old (and young) men everywhere will rejoice!
Donte Alistair Anderson Roberts - hi son!
Karma: Chameleon
THz radiation may cause DNA resonance:
http://science.slashdot.org/story/09/10/30/1216230/how-terahertz-waves-tear-apart-dna
Not safe...
http://adsabs.harvard.edu/abs/2010PhLA..374.1214A
Now, google it...find out for yourself.
We need to petition to get these wavelengths banned. These crazy scientists with their fancy lasers that use these dangerous frequencies must be stopped!
Here's a quick mock-up of how it will look: http://i.imgur.com/2aA3Z.jpg
ZAPHOD: It’s a carbon copy of the Ravenous Bugblatter Beast of Traal - or I’m a Vogon’s Grandmother! ARTHUR: The Ravenous Bugblatter Beast of Traal! Is it safe? [Sound of the Ravenous Bugblatter Beast of Traal salivating] FORD: Oh Yes! It’s perfectly safe - it’s just us who are in trouble.
This is slashdot, after all. Most youngsters are already avoiding this harmful radiation by hiding in their mother's basement...
I agree, but we shouldn't use the name "completely safe" until it's tested and proven to be safe.
Why don't we just all agree to call all these technologies "Mostly Harmless" until proven otherwise.
Then there will be no confusion.
And if there is confusion, the idiots who are confused need to learn to read, then read a good book. A good book written by Douglas Adams. Then they will understand. They will understand in exactly the same way that bricks don't.
Imagine if EMTs could get a decent body scan before you've even arrived at the hospital. Doctors could receive a patient having already spent a few minutes going over the scans prior to their arrival.
I've decided to stop wasting my time responding to AC trolls/sockpuppets... so if you want a response from me... login.
I've been waiting a long time for the 'X-Ray' glasses in the back of Boy's Life to actually work. No matter how many pair I bought, or how hard I squinted, they never did the job.
If your dentist is subjecting you to excruciating pain, I suggest you find a different dentist. Most dental procedures are completely pain-free these days.
There is this dentist who uses a manual drill while inhaling nitrous oxide himself and laughing uncontrollably.
-But then again, there is also this nice portrayal of a dentist in the Marathon Man
I was with you up to green, but red is a menace! It's a RED menace.
I'm a little curious about the medical uses for the technology. Terahertz EM radiation should have similar wavelengths to Ultrasound, which only penetrates a few inches and lacks resolution. It's very useful, don't get me wrong, but no replacement for X-rays, CT, or MRI (click for images of kidney stones using each modality). Plus, ultrasound is becoming even less reliable due to the obesity epidemic, as it can't penetrate a foot of fat very well. Per Wikipedia THz can penetrate low-water tissue several millimeters, which is similar to visible light seen by the unaided eye.
Dermatologists and Dentists may find it useful, but I'm having trouble seeing the application into other medical fields. (Someone can chime in if there's something, I haven't been keeping up on it.) IMHO, it's premature to consider installing these in the clinic. Before that happens there needs to be some unique and significant benefit, which outweighs the risks, and is cost effective. Until then, keep it in the research labs where portability and miniaturization is less of an issue. We don't need technology in the clinic for technology's sake, it just drives up costs and increases wait times.
The chip that the original article mentions has a PLL and an integrated transmitting antenna and produces 2 mW. That IS safe, but not useful for doctor's office scanners. To be useful for scanners, they're going to have to amp it up by at least 20 dB (probably a lot more) and irradiate the part of you they want to examine. And they'll have to add an array of terahertz receivers tuned to the emitter's frequency if they want to do imaging, and the waveform captured by all those receivers is going to have to be downconverted and processed by a computer comparably powerful to the ones they use for ultrasound. And it will have similar resolution to ultrasound, but will be differently reflected within the body because it's an electromagnetic wave not an acoustic one. And it will dissipate rapidly as it passes through the body because its skin depth is going to be about the thickness of your skin. So they'll have to blast the living hell out of you if they want to look at your spleen or inside your head and you'll be wishing they used something that didn't burn your skin quite so much.
my doctors and dentists arent creepy enough as it is, i was just thinking how great it would be for them to have handheld scanners with the ability to see through clothing.
Are you worried by 100 THz radiation? Because that is commonly called "light". The visible spectrum is from about 400-790 THz.
Radiation is only ionizing, and thus cancer causing, when it is high frequency. X-rays (already in use in medicine if you didn't notice) are much higher frequency, they are past visible light, past UV.
However completely unlike the airport scanners these devices will need to clear FDA and FCC regulations and inspection/testing. The people who operate them will have to take classes and be certified and licensed to operate the device. The devices themselves will be licensed and inspected on a regular basis by the state boards of health.
None of this is seems true for the airport systems.
Article X: The powers not delegated... by the Constitution...are reserved...to the people
No to mention, the fact that going to the dentist is already bad enough without having to go through a pat down and strip search.. Keep TSA out of my mouth!!!
The next step, once there's terahertz scanning capability in a hand-held device, is to add an accurate short-range location system to the device. Then it becomes possible to do most of the job of a CT scanner, building up a 3D image, with a hand-held device and a lot of compute power. This will be a big win for medicine.
It might be sufficient to put a 6-axis IMU chip in the device and use SLAM to correct for cumulative error. Then you could reference to the body being scanned, not the world coordinate system, and get clean scans even if the patient moves a little.
A useful marketing strategy would be to deploy this first for veterinarians. This avoids many of the regulatory issues.
I want something like this for home use.
Cheap, effective, safe : Pick two.
It's completely safe!
Given the fundamentals here there is no reason to be concerned about the safety of terahertz radiation. It is certainly far safer than the alternatives which have large known risks.
Unless you have an insulin pump.
http://www.inquisitr.com/233195/tsa-breaks-teens-insulin-pump-during-forced-full-body-scanner-examination/
Then it's pretty damn dangerous, particularly if it happens to be on when the scanner kills the control circuitry for the pump.
The dentist will allow you to opt out, in favour for a traditional cavity search.
There is very good evidence that terahertz waves are anything but safe!
Whereas X-rays pass through most body parts, leading to a very low rate of absorption that is also spread throughout most of the body, terahertz waves are the opposite: a minority of the radiation is reflected back to the scanner, but the majority is completely absorbed by the tissue at the depth of penetration. And because that depth is pretty specific, what you have is a very thin layer of tissue that is completely absorbing a great deal of energy from the radiation.
If you really think about that, you will change your mind about any "completely safe" claims. We need tests and more tests and double-blind tests, before it can be declared "safe", and even then we would need to wait for a long time to rule out any possible long-term effects.
"The radiation is too high-frequency to excite any of the electrons orbiting the atoms in the human body (which is how UV causes damage)"
You meant too LOW frequency , as terahertz is about order of magnitude of micrometer of wavelength : it is in the infrared part of the spectra (far or near depending on how many THz we are speaking of). In fact frequency is going from very low (VHF->FIF->NIF->Visible) to very high (Blue->UV->X->Gamma). Higher frequency=High energy is bad as it can easily knock electron off orbits. Low Frequency=Low Energy less dangerous, to even inactive on our body. Which is the invert with wavelength (short wave =very dangerous , very long wave think radio BHV etc harmless). Then there is also the question of quantity, but as a rule of thumb it is enough.
C. Sagan : A demon haunted world:
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0345409469/
visit randi.org
... +10^10 internets.
As others have pointed out, consider a powerful laser operating at that frequency.
Of course, that could be used to someone's benefit -> "Now Bob, they're going to play a trick on you down at the high-energy lab, and tell you that you shouldn't walk in front of their laser; but Bob, have you ever heard of blue light, even a very bright blue light (like at that club), ever hurting anyone? Of course not; so I figure we can one up them if you show them you know about their trick by walking in front of their big blue laser when it's on. Show that you're not afraid, 'cause you got nothing to be scared from an overgrown night-light."
I am John Hurt.
...what is free at the airport will soon cost $2,000 at your doctor's office.
Proverbs 21:19
Yes, but the question stands: Is it safe?
I am John Hurt.
The federal market for these machines is tapped out? And the associated businesses like money?
I am John Hurt.
Um... UV rays are also Thz waves, and are clearly known to cause skin cancer.
So no, I'd say that the whole 'completely safe' thing is not just a given.
A big chunk of them are xray scanners.
It isn't the scanner working under normal conditions that would worry me so much.
But if it malfunctions and spews out lots of radiation all over the airport, that might worry me.
I still won't go through them or have my kids go through them.
Giving your dentist the ability to take naked photos of you with a scanner is probably better than the old where he used anesthetic.
Didn't these used to say that X-rays were safe?
No.
As another poster has already mentioned: The discoverers of X-rays warned from the beginning that there might be harm, and reports of damage from exposure were in the literature within the first couple years.
(Now some people may have said, somewhere along the way, that some level of X-rays is safe. Manufacturers and users of X-ray equipment, for example. B-) )
Bantam Dominique roosters crow a four-note song. Once you've heard it as "Happy BIRTHday" you can't NOT hear it that way
All the TSA agent has to do is point at you (well, with some reason of course), and the cops would arrest you.
Also, once you come into view of the checkpoint you are not allowed to leave without permission and may be detained if you try.
Assaulting a TSA agent would not be considered assaulting a police office[r]...
Agreed, "assaulting a peace officer" wouldn't apply. But don't they also have a separate special charge for screwing around with TSA people and operations, similar to the post-9/11 "interfering with a flight crew" prohibition?
Bantam Dominique roosters crow a four-note song. Once you've heard it as "Happy BIRTHday" you can't NOT hear it that way
The reason we use xray at the dentist for example is to look at the density of bones for various lesion and holes, or how the root grow etc....
And the reason that's what we look for is because we CAN. That's what X-rays do that's useful.
Nothing the terrahertz technology can really replace.
Though it does it somewhat differently, it may be able to do at least some of those. Perhaps even something good enough to replace all of them. And it may be able to do other useful things that X-rays don't.
Right now they just got a transmitter and receiver working on a chip. Let's hang in there until they get some systems built up and see what can be practically engineered.
Bantam Dominique roosters crow a four-note song. Once you've heard it as "Happy BIRTHday" you can't NOT hear it that way
First, this frequency range is absorbed by water very, very effectively (fractions of a milimiter is enough to shut it out completely) and man is mainly water. So it can see just under the skin. Then - resolution. 390 GHz has wavelength of about a millimeter - not much to see in a human tooth. At last - power. 2 microwatts is not much, it is not much at all. There is no very sensitive detectors without cryogenic cooling, so ...
We have some time to figure out is terahertz radiation really safe.
Yeah we need far more testing on radiation. Especially in the 400nm to 700nm range.
Sure they say its perfectly safe but how long have we been exposing ourselves to it? More data is required!
Together with dihydrogen monoxide.
World would be much better off without such radiation and substances.
http://opencm3.net, http://www.nongnu.org/gm2/
The dentist will allow you to opt out, in favour for a traditional cavity search.
I actually did laugh out loud for this one. I almost had wine out my nose. I had mod points but it was already +5.
I think the +5 Insightful has more to do with how plausible it is to say that and loonies would believe it, rather than the moderators believing in it themselves.
At least I sure hope that.
The safety of any kind of radiation should be DEMONSTRATED before every being used on human bodies, especially on a large scale!
I am aware that there are reasons to be skeptical about any damage being done, but we have, many times in the past, been surprised to find that things we previously thought harmless were in fact very dangerous.
Example: X-Rays were initially not thought to be especially harmful, but we eventually learned that it very much was. True, it didn't take very long before X-Rays were looked at with increasing caution, but that was the exception.
The Curies themselves died of radiation poisoning. Even so, workers in plants that made radium watch dials continued to get sick and die in abnormal numbers, for decades, before the practice was stopped.
Tanning beds are now known to be harmful, even though they were touted as using "safe" forms of UV, just a few short years ago.
Sub-millimeter radiation has been studied for how long now? It has been in widespread use for how long?
SHOW that it is safe, or at least relatively safe, and I'll drop my objections. Until then, I'll keep them. Saying that it's safe merely because it's "low power" doesn't cut it.
Besides: aren't we forgetting the main thing? These scanners are proven to be incapable of effectively performing the function they are used for. So why are we debating this at all?