Barcode scanners have been featured in the mainstream press more frequently of late. Lately, we’ve seen coverage around the use of barcode scanners to identify zebras and implement better screening of US food and medicinal imports.

A New Scientist article “Barcode scanners for zebras,” discusses how barcode scanning is enabling scientists to accurately identify zebras in the field. A team of US computer scientists and biologists have come up with a scanner, allowing them to identify individual animals from a single still photo. According to the article, the zebra scanner is not the first algorithm developed to identify animals in the field – there are also systems for tagging turtles, penguins and rhinos. This new system could also be applied to tigers and giraffes, or any animal with large markings in a small number of distinctive colors.

Bar code scanners also took center stage at recent FDA discussions. FDA Commissioner Margaret Hamburg provided an update to the US House of Representatives Subcommittee on Oversight and Investigations on PREDICT and other FDA initiatives designed to improve the safety of food and drug imports in the USA. She underscored the importance of initiatives such as PREDICT, a system that makes use of barcode scanners linked to a centralized database which can raise an alert if the pharmaceutical shipment is high-risk.

One thing is clear: a variety of industries are turning to barcode systems to make clearer connections and track and identify critical information, products, humans and animals in real-time.