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Superman's Memory Crystals Inch Closer to Reality

Hard drives could soon be made from glass

By Matt Cantor,  Newser Staff

Posted Aug 15, 2011 10:17 AM CDT | Updated Aug 20, 2011 1:00 PM CDT

(Newser) – The “memory crystals” Superman used to hear messages left by his parents are no longer just science fiction. Researchers in Britain have found a way to store computer data on glass by reorganizing its atoms. A laser creates miniscule dots, known as voxels, in silica glass. Light passing through the glass is thus polarized and can be read using special equipment, the Telegraph reports.

The method is much longer-lasting than current methods of storing data: Today's hard-drives can only survive for a matter of decades and are susceptible to heat and moisture. The glass can tolerate temperatures as high as 1,800 degrees, isn’t damaged by water, and can survive for millennia—and researchers have already been able to fit a Blu-ray disc’s worth of data, about 50GB, on a piece of glass the size of a cell-phone screen. “We have developed this memory which means data can be stored on the glass and last forever. It could become a very stable and safe form of portable memory,” a researcher says.

A sci-fi element of Superman comics may soon be reality.
A sci-fi element of Superman comics may soon be reality.   (AP Photo/DC Comics)
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COMMENTS
Showing 3 of 13 comments
carson
Aug 15, 2011 10:48 PM CDT
in 2001 i read a fortune magazine article that predicted by 2013 all of the music currently in production {then 150,000 individual cd titles} would fit on a single hard drive in mp3 format...over the years moores law has whittled away towards this...we are very close...5 terabytes will just about do it
crafter67
Aug 15, 2011 9:03 PM CDT
"It could become a very stable and safe form of portable memory,” Except in earthquake areas...
Jingo
Aug 15, 2011 5:47 PM CDT
DC should have patented the technology in the 30's

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