Friday, May 29, 2009

New storage research could mean data lifespan of 1 billion years!


By any stretch of the imagination, today's data densities are amazing! Today it is possible to store 10 to 100 gigabits of data per square inch on today's memory cards. That is a huge amount of data by any standard. Of course this technology comes at a price. Because of it's density today's data has an estimated life expectancy of only 10 to 30 years. What is even more cause for concern is the fact that even higher storage densities are needed for future electronic devices. That should frighten even the most stalwart of digital storage devotees.

But now researchers are reporting that they are working on a computer memory device that can store thousands of times more data than conventional silicon chips with an estimated lifetime of more than one billion years! This according to an article in ScienceDaily.

The researchers describe development of a memory device consisting of an iron nanoparticle enclosed in a hollow carbon nanotube. In the presence of electricity, the nanoparticle can be shuttled back and forth with great precision. This creates a programmable memory system that, like a silicon chip, can record digital information and play it back. Plus researchers showed that the device had a storage capacity as high as 1 terabyte per square inch (a trillion bits of information) and temperature-stability in excess of one billion years.

read more in the ScienceDaily article

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