Design and Evaluation of a Sensitive, Low Cost and Portable Millimeter Wave Survey Meter

We developed a small, hand-held, portable, low cost, millimeter wave (mmW) meter to detect and display the levels of emissions from L3 ProVision security scanners used in hundreds of airports for detection of contraband and weapons. The meter is intended to measure radiation emissions from this particular scanner and enable the user to enable periodic quality assurance measurements and to see if undesirably high levels were to occur. The non-engineering staff of the Transportation Security Administration (TSA) can use this meter to demonstrate safety of these scanners to passengers using this simple handheld instrument certified by the US Food Drug administration. This meter can assess human exposure levels during periodic quality assurance inspections, in a region where a person is being scanned, and demonstrate the lack of possible interference with body worn medical devices. It has receiving, signal processing, output display, and user control subsystems, and displays graphical and numerical information. The meter detects low level, pulses of mmW electromagnetic radiation (20 - 30 GHz with levels of 0.02 V/m to 0.15 V/m). It displays a single burst of five or more 10 μsec pulses. It detects levels as low as several thousand times below the maximum permissible levels prescribed by international human exposure safety standards. This compact system replaces the bulky and costly collection of large and costly instruments needed to perform the same measurements.