Random Thought of the Day

What if you discovered an ancient tome that was so old, it was impossible to open and read its contents... How on Earth would you ever manage to discover the wealth of information hidden between its covers? Imagine all the discoveries and insight Man would miss out on...

Solution!!!

Just CT scan that shit!

Researchers at the University of Texas in Austin were granted permission to scan a book printed in 1584 by Pedro Orcharte of Mexico. They left the tome inside its protective case and scanned 782 pages using X-ray CT technology, allowing researchers to digitally open the book and read its contents without ever turning a page!

In case you didn't know, CT stands for computed tomography, which, in case you didn't know, is the process of scanning various 2D "slices" of a 3D object in order to visualize the whole object digitally. In the case of this ancient tome, each "slice" that the researchers scanned was a different set of pages. The x-rays used in the CT scan are reflected by the iron in the ink on each page allowing researchers to piece together the entire book one page at a time.

Now if only they could read Latin...

Check out some more info on this really cool scanning method HERE!