Patent ID: 7432825

Claim:
An interrogation apparatus for communicating with at least one transponder, comprising: at least one antenna portion operable to transmit an interrogation signal to the transponder and to receive a data signal from the transponder; a processing portion operably interconnected to said at least one antenna portion operable to receive the data signal and to determine the presence or absence of body characteristic data within the data signal, and when the presence of body characteristic information is detected, decode the data signal to obtain at least said body characteristic information; and an output portion operable to output, when the presence of body characteristic information is detected, said body characteristic information; wherein said processing portion is operable to receive said data signal, demodulate said data signal into an information signal, and determine the contents of the information signal, wherein said processing portion is operable to identify an indicator within said information signal, and determine the presence of body characteristic information based on the indicator, and wherein said information signal contains a plurality of indicators, and said processing portion is operable to determine the presence of body characteristic information based on any detected differences between one or more of the plurality of indicators.