Full body scanning has become an essential practice in correctional facilities and other places, as it provides the most accurate means of contraband detection available.

Of the two body scanning technologies that are used today that are backscatter and millimeter wave, it is the former that is most commonly used in corrections facilities, partly because this technology has been available the longest. 

What Is Backscatter X-Ray?

Body scanning x-ray devices used in airports, corrections facilities, federal buildings, and others employ a technology called backscatter x-ray, which is a low-power, digital version of the old x-ray machines that imposed images on photographic film.

The old machines involved an image scanner behind the body and an x-ray tube in front, a setup that required a considerable dose of radiation that had to pass through the body to create the image on the film.

Today’s x-ray body scanning machines are fortunately much weaker and much safer. 

What Are Full Body Scanning Machines?

Also called soft x-ray scanners, modern low-intensity full body scanning machines contain a single image scanner on one side of the body only and an x-ray tube close to the image scanner.

With the image scanner and the x-ray tube on the same side, x-rays do not need to fully penetrate the body to generate an image.

Instead, these weaker x-rays only penetrate through clothing and about an inch into the body, where they scatter, bounce off structures within the body, then ricochet back to the image scanner.

The data generated by the scattering and rebounding x-rays are used to create the x-ray image. 

How Do Body Scanning Machines Discern Different Body Parts?

How do body scanning machines differentiate between flesh, bone, and other items?

Different shades in the image are generated according to the way that low-powered x-rays behave as they enter the body, then bounce back out.

Based on the density and makeup of different materials, the energy signatures of ions and atoms and other factors, clear, details x-ray images are produced. 

How Is Contraband Detected?

How do modern body scanning machines now detect contraband so easily?

Continued advancement in full body scanning machines has now led to technology such as software that understands the physical makeup of various substances, from parts of the human body to non-human items like weapons, packets of drugs, paper, and much more.

Based on the response generated by low-powered x-rays as they scatter and bounce back, the body scanning machine is able to detect the physical makeup of everything in front of the scanner. 

This Is a Developing Technology

The x-ray technology used in body scanners continues to develop, making it not just more accurate, but also safer.

As full body scanning continues to evolve, corrections facilities and others using these machines can continue to accomplish fast, safe scanning while delivering the smallest doses of radiation possible.

Fortunately, today’s top-of-the-line full body x-ray scanners have been approved as being exceptionally safe, with little risk for repeated use.