The Transportation Security Administration is commissioning a study about whether the X-ray body scanners used to screen passengers at airports emit too much radiation. The study also will evaluate whether the design and maintenance of machines that use X-ray technology could prevent over-exposure to harmful radiation. The safety of X-ray screening machines was called into question in a 2011 report by ProPublica, a non-profit investigative news group, which suggested that up to 100 U.S. airline passengers per year could contract cancer from airport screenings.

Engine overhaul expenditures will grow modestly in the short term, but prepare for a spike.

Tony Tyler is director general and CEO of the International Air Transport Association

Airframers plot next moves amid record-breaking production rates.

Commercial-scale, competitively priced production of drop-in biofuel replacements for petroleum-based jet fuel remains elusive, but technology work continues unabated. Two synthetic-fuel pathways are already approved for use in aircraft, in blends up to 50%: Fischer-Tropsch synthetic paraffinic kerosene (SPK) from coal, gas or biomass; and hydroprocessed esters and fatty acids (HEFA) from animal fats and vegetables oils. At least two more could be added in 2013: alcohol-to-jet (ATJ) and synthetic kerosene with aromatics (SKA).

A three-dimensional holographic radar that overcomes wind-farm interference with air traffic control radars could be commercially operational by late 2013. When an aircraft flies over a wind farm, its track can be lost amid the Doppler returns from the rotating blades of wind turbines. The problem is growing, as wind farms proliferate worldwide. Aveillant's holographic infill radar with its flat phased-array antennas provides the missing position and altitude data for aircraft.

European government bickering scuttled a mega-merger of EADS and BAE Systems, and the Pentagon continues to hold firm against further consolidation among its top contractors. But consolidation amid second- and third-tier contractors is likely to accelerate as defense spending heads down in the U.S. and Europe.

Russia's air transport industry continues to grow at a fast pace for the third year in a row. This advance is accompanied by the liberalization of the international flights segment as well as the industry's consolidation, backed by the government.