Forward-looking: Researchers at the University of Chicago have achieved a groundbreaking milestone, storing terabytes of digital data within a crystal cube just one millimeter in size. They accomplished this by leveraging single-atom defects within the crystal to represent the binary 1s and 0s of data storage.
Data storage has always depended on systems that toggle between "on" and "off" states. However, the physical size of the components storing these binary states has traditionally limited how much information can be packed into a device.
Now, researchers at the University of Chicago's Pritzker School of Molecular Engineering have developed a way to overcome this constraint. They've successfully demonstrated how missing atoms within a crystal structure can be used to store terabytes of data in a space no larger than a millimeter.
"We found a way to integrate solid-state physics applied to radiation dosimetry with a research group that works strongly in quantum, although our work is not exactly quantum," said first author Leonardo França, a postdoctoral researcher in Zhong's lab.
Their study, published in Nanophotonics, explores how atomic-scale crystal defects can function as individual memory cells, merging quantum methodologies with classical computing principles.
Led by assistant professor Tian Zhong, the research team developed this novel storage method by introducing rare-earth ions into a crystal. Specifically, they incorporated praseodymium ions into a yttrium oxide crystal, though they suggest the approach could extend to other materials due to rare-earth elements' versatile optical properties.
The memory system is activated by a simple ultraviolet laser, which energizes the rare-earth ions, causing them to release electrons. These electrons then become trapped in the crystal's natural defects. By controlling the charge state of these gaps, the researchers effectively created a binary system, where a charged defect represents a "one" and an uncharged defect represents a "zero."
Crystal defects have previously been explored in relation to quantum computing as potential qubits. However, the UChicago PME team went a step further, discovering how to leverage them for classical memory applications.
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"There is a demand for people who are doing research on quantum systems, but at the same time, there is a demand for improving the storage capacity of classical non-volatile memories. And it's on this interface between quantum and optical data storage where our work is grounded," says França.
The researchers believe this breakthrough could redefine data storage limits, paving the way for ultra-compact, high-capacity storage solutions in classical computing.
Scientists use crystals to cram terabytes of data into millimeter-sized memory
