Research on a 60Co container inspection system began in 1995, and the prototype of the system was constructed and operated successfully at INET in 1997. The first operational 60Co container inspection system (fixed type) had been put into operation in Fuzhou City (Mawei Harbor), southern China in 1999.

The TC-SCAN 60Co container inspection system was designed to be a fast, accurate and efficient anti-smuggling and terrorism deterrent for container/cargo inspection. The radiation source used is the 60Co projector (Amersham product).It is specialized with a gas-pressurized array ion-chamber detector, which carries several worldwide patents. With the special array detector and the advanced signal and image processing technology, these inspection systems possess excellent characteristics and are as good as the fixed type inspection systems using an accelerator source of 4-9MV. The Contrast Indicator (CI) and the Image Quality Indicator (IQI) for 100mm steel are 0.5% and 2.5%, respectively. The Steel Penetration (SP) is about 240mm (iron), the throughput is 30 standard containers per hour, and the maximum dose per scan is less than 5 mSv.

Since 1999, four new types of 60Co scanner (mobile, re-locatable, air-cargo pallet and cargo train scanner) have been developed. These systems can fulfill different kinds of Custom's requirement. In addition, a digital radiography/computed tomography (DR/CT) for air cargo inspection systems has also been developed recently.