Full-Body Airport Scanners Downsizing For Doctors/Dentists 221
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!"
"completely safe" (Score:5, Insightful)
I'll wait to believe terahertz radiation is "completely safe" for a little while, yet.
Re:"completely safe" (Score:5, Insightful)
Safe means we don't know what bad thing it does yet.
Re:"completely safe" (Score:5, Insightful)
With the sort of logic that is popular these days we would have rejected fire as unsafe (radiation from a fire is higher frequency than this THz - i.e. very far infrared) and still be eating our food raw in unheated caves.
There is no such thing as "completely safe". The idea is preposterous. It is even more preposterous that we can prove something to be completely safe. Every heartbeat or breath you take is at great risk.
It's all about rational risk assessment and testing. 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.
Re:"completely safe" (Score:5, Insightful)
Is terahertz radiation safer than x-rays? Quite possibly. If we use terahertz radiation to excess will it be safer than x-rays? Quite possibly not.
Re:"completely safe" (Score:5, Interesting)
There was never a time when X-Rays were considered completely safe. Roentgen and Thompson both issued warnings regarding overexposure. Within a year of their discovery reports of injuries started appearing.
http://goatrevolution.com/blog2/2006/11/10/radiation-part-cinque-further-uses-and-discoveries-of-x-ray-radiation/ [goatrevolution.com]
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Edison seemed to think it was perfectly safe and into the '50s stores were using the fluoroscope to make sure that shoes were properly fitting.
You can always find somebody that thinks something is dangerous from the start, the questions really are whether they are credible and how seriously they're being taken.
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Are you saying Roentgen isn't credible? In most places those things are still called Roentgen rays.
The guy was only the first Noble laureate in Physics.
Man that has to be one of the biggest FRSTS.
Re:"completely safe" (Score:5, Insightful)
No doctor or dentist I've ever been to was ever 'reluctant' to call for an x-ray. As long as you're insured, it's free money for them to call for an x-ray, whether you need it or not. Last time I went in for neck pain, the doctor actually told me that whatever was causing my pain would most likely only show up on an MRI (as it was most likely due to tissue, not bone, issues), but he wanted to take an x-ray "just to see", and that he'd call for an MRI only if I still had pain a week or two later.
As long as every doctor/dentist has an x-ray machine in-house that they can charge your insurance company for, whether it's really needed or not, they'll use it. If we can replace x-ray with some other most likely less-harmful tech, I'm in.
Re:"completely safe" (Score:5, Insightful)
When the dentist takes x-rays, they first cover me with a lead blanket from neck to knee and then they leave the room while the pictures are being taken. That's because we know that x-rays are dangerous, and we understand how they're dangerous and what steps should be taken to minimize the risk while still taking advantage of the technology.
If it's "perfectly safe", no such precautions will be taken. Decades from now, we'll know whether they should have been.
Re:"completely safe" (Score:5, Informative)
You are not taking into account, that doctors are wary of using MRI devices for scheduling and expense reasons. An X-ray image from a leased dental device is almost free (less than a hundred euros for private institutions here) and takes mere minutes, while an MRI scan costs thousands of euros and may take hours.
Also, since MRI is more useful in a wider variety of situations, someone else probably needs it more or needs it sooner - you might end up having a huge waiting time to get yourself scanned. It is prudent to take the x-ray, because if the doctor can see the ailment there, the MRI scan may not be needed at all. He will also send you out, because if the pain disappears in a couple of weeks, the MRI won't be necessary. Money, time, work, and possibly lives, might be spared.
If you are worried about the risks of a single x-ray, I assure you that they are beyond neglible - especially if you compare that risk with the possible wasted utility of an MRI device.
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If you are worried about the risks of a single x-ray, I assure you that they are beyond neglible - especially if you compare that risk with the possible wasted utility of an MRI device.
The risk of a single x-ray, multiplied by millions of people is not negligible. And the wasted utility of an MRI device wouldn't be a problem if we built more MRIs to offset the X-rays we should be deprecating.
Re:"completely safe" (Score:5, Informative)
Incorrect (Score:5, Interesting)
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.
Re:Incorrect (Score:4, Informative)
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Stare into a gigahertz waveguide for a few seconds and we'll see how harmless "low" frequency signals are (these are obviously even lower than terahertz and you will go blind).
If we reconstitute your post with the bits that would lead it to make some sort of sense, I assume you're talking about microwave heating. In that case, this was already addressed: "...it will warm you up if left on for too long..." The eyes in particular are bad at removing heat because of the lack of blood in much of them. Anyway, it'd take a lot of microwaves to cause any damage. Taping your wifi router to your eye will hurt you, but only because taping stuff to your eye hurts.
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Unfortunately, that misses a point:
The individual photons of terahertz radiation are at far too low an energy to ionize an atom or molecule or otherwise substantially affect a molecular bond, most foldings, and other molecular behavior. (That's a vast improvement on x-rays, where each photon has enough energy to ionize anything it interacts with, demolishing molecular bonds and spraying reactive species throughout highly-organized structures.)
But terahertz radiation is is COHERENT. That means billions of
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There was an article here a week or so ago [slashdot.org] that answers your question. The TSA is a psychological warfare campaign being carried out under the guise of a security practice. Its purpose is to scare would-be bombers into staying home. When there's a credible threat, they introduce new policies until the problem goes away. That's why grandpa is allowed to keep his jacket on—because he isn't likely to be impressionable or political enough to carry a bomb.
In essence, it's more straight out of George Orwell
Mostly Harmless (Score:4, Insightful)
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.
Re:Mostly Harmless (Score:4, Insightful)
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No reason to be concerned? (Score:2)
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/ [inquisitr.com]
Then it's pretty damn dangerous, particularly if it happens to be on when the scanner kills the control circuitry for the pump.
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Which, arguably, is almost as dangerous as if the TSA mistakes the insulin pump for a bomb.
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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.
Not quite. Terahertz radiation is by no means "certainly far safer" than choosing not to be irradiated by any method.
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The Kraken.
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Lol, super-tumors.
Re:"completely safe" (Score:5, Funny)
440THz is sometimes called "red"
560THz is sometimes called "green"
640THz is sometimes called "blue"
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I was with you up to green, but blue is a menace! It's a blue menace!
Re:Communist (Score:2, Funny)
Re:"completely safe" (Score:5, Funny)
It's pretty safe and has been tested over a very long time period. They've even given certain THz frequencies their own names.
440THz is sometimes called "red"
560THz is sometimes called "green"
640THz is sometimes called "blue"
And they stopped there because 640 THz should be enough for everybody.
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Well, until the recommended system requirements for Windows 8 are published anyway.
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It means don't eliminate my chance to make a buttload of money until you have proof that I'm killing people. After all money is more important than any other consideration.
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"Well, they're all going to die someday anyways."
2 milliwatts! (Score:2)
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At least DDT is safer than malaria.
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DDT is pretty safe if you aren't a bird.
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DDT is pretty safe if you aren't a bird.
It's safe sex for birds of prey.
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DDT is pretty safe if you aren't a bird.
Depends how you define "safe". DDT won't kill you, but it is a persistent and bio-accumulating endocrine disrupter -- even decades after being banned in most places, it is still universally detectable in human breast milk (one of the tissues in which it concentrates).
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Which, putting aside its usage as a political football by environmentalists, is kind of responsible for the lack of swarms of mosquitoes that have plagued this continent and a few others before its introduction. Historical journals document how good we have it now compared to the early pioneers.
Abolish the TSA (Score:5, Insightful)
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Throw that on a poster and it'll be almost as worthless as those other platitudes: "Don't work harder, work smarter!"
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"There's no 'I' in team."
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Scanners belong in doctors' offices, not airports.
like Dr. Emma Garrison-Alexander [tsa.gov]?
[as a side note: in Germany, a Dr. in front of the name is an important status symbol, it is really unlikely to see a governing body of any bigger company/state agency/whatever with only one doctorate. Interesting, I saw your doctor comment and automagically expected lot's of Dr.'s, my German POV was wrong...]
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Scanners belong in doctors' offices, not airports.
See, the TSA would be much more popular if they just advertised it as a free diagnostic scan and gave a certificate of health - or a diagnosis afterwards.
"Sir, you're carrying a bomb and a duodenal ulcer. Please step over here so we can disarm the bomb and give you emergency radiotherapy for the cancer."
X-rays (Score:2)
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Just let everyone board the plane and be on their way -or- we'll start scanning people boarding buses next.
Yeah, the former option is never going to happen. No authorities ever give up powers like that without a very good fight, and usually expand them bit by bit.
No. (Score:2)
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-) )
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We've known that lead is poisonous for about 2,000 years.
Re:X-rays (Score:5, Funny)
hell yeah! (Score:5, Funny)
If I were a dentist, I'd certainly want to know if you're packing heat before I start subjecting you to excruciating pain ;-)
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Yes, but the question stands: Is it safe?
Completely Safe... (Score:5, Insightful)
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Do you really think that the TSA wage-slaves are designing multi-million dollar scanners in between confiscating toothpaste and groping tourists? You do know that they have actual scientists and engineers and doctors inventing this stuff... right? I'll trust their judgement over that of a random poster in an internet forum.
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A random poster in an internet forum frequented by scientists and engineers.
But I have a better idea. Let's grab one of the more expendable ones from the TSA, and stick 'em inside the scanner, fully powered up and constantly scanning, for a month. Unless we somehow manage to pick someone with the golden immune system of the gods, we'll know, at the end of the month, whether there is anything dangerous about these scanners. Well, immediately dangerous. If that person shows multiple metastasized tumors throug
Well if THz radation worries you (Score:3)
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.
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Well then, it's perfectly harmless. So you shouldn't mind spending some time in one. Perhaps even some prolonged time. Perhaps you wouldn't mind some parts from the machine being quietly installed into the walls of your domicile.
Feel free to leave your address. And we apologize in advance for the (much) higher power bill.
Re:Completely Safe... (Score:4, Interesting)
Major correction: TSA screeners, despite having fake tin badges and cop-a-like uniforms, are NOT law-enforcement officers and have absolutely zero authority to do anything other than say "Sorry, you can't enter the airport terminal today, try again tomorrow." That's it. They cannot make arrests, they cannot detain you, they are forbidden from carrying firearms on the job and some have actually been arrested themselves for using their TSA uniforms and toy badges to impersonate real law officers.
I don't fault you for thinking they're LEOs - they've gone to great lengths to dupe people into believing that (reference the STRIP Act that would undo this) and are meeting with a disturbing level of success - but I do try to counter these misconceptions when I see them.
Re:Completely Safe... (Score:4)
True, but only technically. There are always real cops around TSA agents. All the TSA agent has to do is point at you (well, with some reason of course), and the cops would arrest you. Assaulting a TSA agent would not be considered assaulting a police office, and similar charges dont apply when dealing with TSA. Everything else though, is the same.
TSA and arrests. (Score:2)
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 w
Re:Completely Safe... (Score:4, Insightful)
Come on. You can do that with anything.
Drinking tap water is safe. So you wouldn't mind if I submerged you in a tub of it for an hour?
Playing tennis is safe. So you wouldn't mind if I made you play in a hurricane?
Reading slashdot is safe. So you wouldn't mind if I made you sit there reading it for a week while force feeding you cheetos?
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Reading slashdot is safe. So you wouldn't mind if I made you sit there reading it for a week while force feeding you cheetos?
Go on....
Re:Completely Safe... (Score:4, Informative)
Reading slashdot is safe. So you wouldn't mind if I made you sit there reading it for a week while force feeding you cheetos?
For many readers, this is their normal state of existence. >:)
Bah! I preffer the good old days! (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Bah! I preffer the good old days! (Score:4, Funny)
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The federal market for these machines is tapped out? And the associated businesses like money?
DNA resonance (Score:5, Informative)
THz radiation may cause DNA resonance:
http://science.slashdot.org/story/09/10/30/1216230/how-terahertz-waves-tear-apart-dna
Re:DNA resonance (Score:4, Informative)
Modelling DNA Response to THz Radiation
http://arxiv.org/abs/1012.4153 [arxiv.org]
The long and short of it is, it's probably ok but if we're going to start putting them in cell phones, further studying should be done.
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How about if we stick someone in a machine, with it locked in full-power constant scanning mode, for a month?
Mock-up (Score:4, Funny)
Here's a quick mock-up of how it will look: http://i.imgur.com/2aA3Z.jpg [imgur.com]
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http://www.tricorderproject.org/ [tricorderproject.org]
Is it safe? (Score:5, Funny)
paramedics (Score:2)
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.
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Better Late than Never (Score:2)
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.
Medical Utility? (Score:3, Interesting)
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.
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Yeah, I'm missing something (or the articles are off base). Terahertz EM should have LESS penetration than ultrasound. Maybe looking at the surface of teeth would be useful, looking at everyone's subcutaneous fat, not so much.
Anyone of the Physics persuasion care to enlighten us (so to speak)?
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Terahertz EM radiation should have similar wavelengths to Ultrasound, which only penetrates a few inches and lacks resolution.
Actually, resolution using synthetic aperture techniques is very high. In principle (if I understand this correctly) it is an analytical solution and limited only by things like the sampling resolution, timing accuracy, and uncertainty principle, while practical equipment can resolve to far less than a wavelength.
It's INcoherent illumination that is suffers mightily from diffraction
with regulation, licensing and inspection (Score:2)
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.
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It's between microwave and infra red. [wikipedia.org]
If you go up in frequency from Thz, the first frequencies you encounter are infra red. Then visible light. After you go up from that you get UV. And if you go up in frequecy from that you get X rays.
THz scanners may pose a threat, but it's not ionising and thus it poses a different threat (if any)
Hand-held CT scanner (Score:5, Interesting)
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.
Re:Hand-held CT scanner (Score:4, Interesting)
Some industrial and mechanical applications might also be good early adopters. No "medical device" overhead to deal with, and a good-sized market.
"Completely Safe", my cute lily-white ass! (Score:4, Insightful)
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.
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You're missing the really big difference: X-rays are ionizing, terahertz radiation is not. There's a very simple solution to that problem: don't use too much power. Anyone will feel major discomfort before any sort of damage happens.
I bet... (Score:3)
...what is free at the airport will soon cost $2,000 at your doctor's office.
Some of the scanners may be safe. (Score:2)
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.
Re:2 million years of evolution (Score:5, Insightful)
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!
Re:2 million years of evolution (Score:5, Funny)
Do not look into the laser with your remaining eye.
Obviously light in that wavelength range is problematic.
Re:2 million years of evolution (Score:5, Funny)
We need to petition to get these wavelengths banned. These crazy scientists with their fancy lasers that use these dangerous frequencies must be stopped!
Re:2 million years of evolution (Score:5, Funny)
This is slashdot, after all. Most youngsters are already avoiding this harmful radiation by hiding in their mother's basement...
Re:2 million years of evolution (Score:5, Funny)
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... +10^10 internets.
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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
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Yes, technology that can't see a knife behind a pancake pasted onto a stomach is the way to go.
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I want something like this for home use.
Cheap, effective, safe : Pick two.
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(Well, he can ask, but the only result will be that the patient goes to a different doctor.) -> Not if he is quick enough.