Storing data in atoms
DOI: 10.1063/PT.5.029966
Nature : Chlorine atoms have been used to create a tiny 1-kilobyte rewritable storage device. Sander Otte of Delft University of Technology in the Netherlands and his colleagues arranged the chlorine atoms into square grids on a copper surface. By including vacant spaces in between the Cl atoms, the researchers show how the atoms can be moved around using a scanning tunneling microscope and a sharp needle. The resulting patterns of atoms and vacancies can then be used to encode information in binary form. Such a system, if scaled up, could store hundreds of terabytes of data in a device the size of a grain of salt. Besides data storage, the technology could have other applications, such as the design of new materials.
