Patent ID: 8439565

Claim:
A scanning system for inspecting contents of an inspected container, the scanning system comprising: a. a source of penetrating radiation of peak energy exceeding 1 MeV; b. a collimator having an exit slot for forming the penetrating radiation into a fan beam characterized by a transverse dimension measured at the exit slot; c. a plurality of detector plates arcuately disposed at a distance exceeding 5 meters from the source of penetrating radiation, each detector plate comprising: a plurality of detector modules, each detector module comprising a plurality of detector elements, each detector element generating a detector signal corresponding to that detector element, each detector module disposed on a remotely activated alignment plate; and d. a controller for governing orientation of each of the plurality of alignment plates based at least on the detector signal generated by that detector element; such that each detector element of each detector module of each detector plate may be aligned to within a specified fraction of the transverse dimension of the fan beam as measured at the exit slot.