Are ultrashort x-ray pulses likely to be less carcinogenic?

With the development of femtosecond and shorter pulsewidth lasers and the ability to amplify these pulses to incredibly high pulsed power has come the ability to produce ultrashort pulses of x-rays. In previous years sessions of this conference we have proposed use of these ultrashort pulses of x-rays to produce high resolution, high image quality three dimensional x-ray images of breast and other areas of the body. Theoretical studies of the impact of increasing higher power of UV and X-Ray sources for sterilization lead us to question whether very short pulses of extremely high power (but low dose, i.e. J/cm2) may have less carcinogenic effect. If this is true, it could potentially allow greater use of such x-ray systems for breast cancer surveillance as well as other areas such as deep body inspection. In addition, it could allow for creation of better images by use of higher resolution, noise reduction and higher repetition rates. Better images should improve detection.