New 5D Data Storage Crystal

Scientists at the University of Southampton have made a major step forward in the development of digital data storage that is capable of surviving for billions of years. Using nanostructured glass, scientists from the University’s Opto electronics Research centre have developed the recording and retrieval process of five dimensional ( 5D ) digital data by femtosecond laser writing.

Universal Declaration of Human Rights recorded into 5D optical data, the documents were recorded using ultra fast laser, producing extremely short and intense pulses of light. The file is written in three layers of nanostructure dots separated by fiver micrometers. The self assembled nanostructured change the way light travels through glass, modifying polarization of light that can then be read by combination of optical microscope and a polarizer, similar to that found in Polaroid sunglasses.

Coined as the ‘Superman memory crystal’ as the glass memory has been compared to the ‘memory crystals’ used in the superman films, the data is recorded via self-assembled nanostructured created in fused quartz.