I have a list of some 200 plant common names that I need to find the respective scientific names for. I could just google every one of them but if possible I want to use a software package that can automate the task (for the sake of reproducibility and my own sanity).

I thought of writing a python script that queries google (for spelling correction and context dependent search) and then grab the supplied Wikipedia URL and then try to find the scientific name with 'beautifulsoup' but turns out that slaps you with captcha pretty fast.

Is there a package/tool/method that comes closest to being an industry standard?
Using [**EntrezDirect**][1]:

    $ esearch -db taxonomy -query "thale cress" | esummary | xtract -pattern DocumentSummary -element CommonName,ScientificName
    thale cress     Arabidopsis thaliana
    $ esearch -db taxonomy -query "zebra fish" | esummary | xtract -pattern DocumentSummary -element CommonName,ScientificName
    zebra fish      Girella zebra
    zebrafish       Danio rerio

  [1]: http://bit.ly/entrez-direct
