Some libraries are trying to gain an edge by focusing on the "deeply local" material — the stuff that only they have, said Blowers, the librarian in Ohio.

"Everyone has been focusing on the cutting edge and trendy things and the older generation have been left behind, " said Wayne Cooper, simplicITy project manager.

Aiming at the problem of large-scale microscopy images acquisition of two-layer object, an auto-focusing algorithm was proposed based on image edge and adjacent area forecasting.