500 GB on one disc
01 August 2011
Imagine a single disc that holds the equivalent of 20 Blu-ray or 100 standard-format DVDs.
That would be enough capacity to store all the data a person collects in a lifetime, twice over.
GE Global Research (GRC) has announced a major breakthrough in the development of next generation optical storage technology.
The micro holographic technology allows 500 gigabytes of storage in a standard DVD-size disc, making the archival possibilities – for everything from financial records to medical documents – virtually endless.
Traditionally, DVDs stored data on a thin metal layer applied to the disc’s plastic hull. Recent advances upped storage capacity by adding up to four metallic layers, each densely packed with data in a way that only a blue-laser optical reader could uncompress fast enough.
GE’s micro-holographic disc will differ from forerunners in that it will embed data directly onto virtual layers within plastic, stacking 20 blue-laser readable layers one on top of the other to achieve a 500GB capacity.
Ultimately, a team of researchers from the GRC’s Applied Optics and Functional Materials labs is working toward micro-holographic discs that can store 1000 GB, or 1 terabyte, of data. That’s enough capacity to store all the X-ray films of a large hospital on a single disc.
Interestingly, there’s no reason the micro-holographic layers must take the form of a disc. And GRC team members remain agnostic about what shape future storage products using the material might assume. Ultimately, the material could become a superior storage alternative to magnetic tape.
For now, GE will be letting potential licensees sample its proprietary holographic data-storage platform, which includes materials, discs, optical systems for manufacturing and optical drive technologies.
Contact Details and Archive...
Related Articles...
Most Viewed Articles...