New Memory Could Store Data for 1 Billion Years

[Guest]

Re: Nano-MECHANICAL... Room-temperature... Those do not sound like the hallmarks of durability to me, and certainly not performance. That's not mechanical like a HDD, that's mechanical like a Ford Mustang, something actually has to move physically, not to read the data, but to actually change the bit.

 

[ossie]

[citation][nom]ProDigit80[/nom]like stated, a trillion bits = 125 000 000 000 bytes, or about 116GB.The title of this article almost sounded like this memory would survive a nuclear holocaust.. In theory it all sounds nice, but I would love to see a nano fiber of steel/iron keeping a charge of a few milivolts for over a billion of times...[/citation]
First, just try to make the difference between capacity and density...
Secondly, the "nano fiber" is a nanotube of carbon, and not of "steel/iron", but containing an iron nanoparticle...
Also, the storage method doesn't imply "a charge of a few milivolts for over a billion of times", but the mechanical displacement of the iron nanoparticle, in the carbon nanotube, by an electric current, and the magnetic field generated by it.
Confusing, all this nanostuff... Eh?

The "stated capacity" and "endurance" are just speculations, to provide some high numbers, for those that are easily impressed by them.
"In lab and theoretical studies, the 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."
Oh, well, some details got lost by Kevin, but it's getting us just a bit closer to the answer(s). There is no "proof of concept" device, yet, to sustain those guesstimations, just some experiments and a lot of hype.

 

[wiyosaya]

This has been all around the net. I am somewhat surprised that Tom's has taken so long to pick it up.

I thought that I read in one of the articles on it that Samsung is already working on commercializing this technology; however, I am unable to find the article that references Samsung. Maybe Samsung is commercializing the holographic DVD.

 

[Guest]

The Singularity is near.... all this is irrelevant.

 

[sonofliberty08]

even the new memory could store data for 1 billion years , but could it still function properly after billion years ? it might already become a rock or already been melt or something .

 

[jee_are]

This would great for a time capsule not that it would matter much to us, but it might to the people in the future. Not to mention hey we could put some data on it and send it to outer space.

Emm, ever hear of a little thing called the Voyager mission?

 

[dman3k]

Evidence of your underaged daughter posting nudes of herself on Myspace will now last forever! Sorry!

 

[nimblehuman]

A billion years is twice the span of all recorded life on Earth so far. Between plate tectonics, asteroid collisions and mass extinction events, it'll probably be insect archaeologists who find our long-lived data storage

 

[Kami3k]

Well in one billion years Earth will have all of it's water evaporated by a ever, yet slowly, expanding sun.

 

[Guest]

Interesting, I suppose it could be utilised by verticaly aligning the nano-rods on a conductive plate and using a scanning-electron microscope to measure tunnelling current, but the practical challenge of self-assembling half a trillion SWCNT-encapsulated iron nanoparticles into something resembling a useful circuit is going to be tricky, what are they going to use, very small tweezers? Sounds like most of the chem papers I read - people hyping up marginal results for the purpose of research grants. What have they actually done here? Wrapped a carbon nanotube around an iron particle - this is nothing new. SWCN's have been synthesized with many types of entrapped particles, show me a working 1Kb sillicon / SWCNT hybrid chip with the manufacturing process required for effective mass production and then i'll be impressed, very impressed.

 

[igot1forya]

Scientists are working on a new memory material that's capable of storing data for... get this... more than one billion years!

I had to repeat again... like Tom's I have to repeat all headlines...

 

[tacoslave]

Now i am so relieved knowing my porn collection will be safe for a billion years.

 

[theangrygimp]

Now if we could only live past the memory sticks ourselves...

 

[nemo888]

There are actually some useful applications. For instance nuclear waste storage facilities. Many of those will need to be in operation for hundreds of thousands of years. Long after we are gone.

Also remember the dark ages. It would be nice to have the complete works of the library of Alexandria available today wouldn't it?