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There are now 24 airports with the walkthrough machines, which puff air onto a person to dislodge tiny particles from skin and clothing. The machine sucks up the particles and then analyzes them for traces of explosives.

One of the biggest weaknesses in U.S. airport security has been the limited ability to detect bombs on passengers. Government screeners have relied largely on patdowns, which are unpopular, time-consuming and incomplete. (More news on airport security: See additional coverage in Today in the Sky)

In contrast, a puffer machine takes 17 seconds to check a passenger and can analyze particles as small as one-billionth of a gram.

"It's more comprehensive and more accurate and it limits the number of patdowns," said TSA spokesman Darrin Kayser. ...(more@link)

The No-Touch Pat-Down

One of the latest—and most amusing—gizmos in airport security: the air puffer



The puffer machine is what the TSA calls an "explosive trace portal­­," a state-of-the-art device capable of detecting traces of explosive residue on a person's body or clothing. Since the summer of 2004, the TSA has installed more than 90 puffer machines in about 35 airports around the country. The puffers are more advanced and less obtrusive than other screening procedures, such as full-body pat-downs, says TSA spokeswoman Anne Davis.

The puff-down works like this: Air jets strategically positioned inside the booth send 37 blasts of air onto the person's body, dislodging particles from the clothing, skin, and hair. The swirling dislodged particles travel upward with the human convection plume, or currents of warmed air that rise around any human body, then get swept into a filter that takes out contaminants like dust, lint, and skin cells.

The resulting vapors are sent to an ion-mobility-spectrometry "trap," where captured molecules are ionized and then blown through a tube containing an electromagnetic field. Each type of ion travels through the field at a certain distinctive speed: the smaller and more charged the ion, the faster it moves and the sooner it arrives at the end of the tube. The ions' flight times are measured and then compared to a database of times for known compounds, including those of bomb ingredients. If explosives are detected, an alarm sounds. While smaller, simpler versions of trace detectors have long been used in airports to analyze cloths rubbed over passengers' carry-on bags, the puffer machine quickly scans the whole person by puffing and then analyzing the samples immediately....(more@link)

These machines blow puffs of air on a traveler, which it then analyzes for trace amounts of explosives. Even the tiniest amount of explosive is no match for a trace portal. Better yet, these great assets to our work can be instantly updated through our vast information technology network to stay ahead of the curve.

n contrast to the traditional X-ray machine, which detects hard and soft materials by the variation in transmission through the target, backscatter X-ray is a newer imaging system which detects the radiation which comes back from the target. It has potential applications in almost every situation in which non-destructive examination is required, but only one side is available for examination. One application currently under exploration is to perform a security scan of airline passengers.



From TSA: http://www.tsa.gov/approach/tech/body_imaging.shtm