Researchers in Japan have built a book scanner capable of capturing 250 pages-per-minute.  To put that into perspective, it would take under ten minutes to scan the entire Oxford English Dictionary.

Think of any generic TV or film robot that processes a book by rapidly flicking through all its pages...this is the literal translation of that!  The machine, dubbed the BFS-Auto, takes high-resolution shots of each page (400 ppi), and uses these shots to create a flat appearance of the page.  All that's required is the human loads the book into the machine and turns the machine on.

Give that bot a library card!  The BFS Auto should be available for commercial purchase in 2013.

Source: BFS-Auto

Jason England