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IBM Researchers Prove It Is Possible To Store Data In a Single Atom (techcrunch.com)
In an experiment published today in Nature, IBM researchers have managed to read and write data to a single atom. A previous atomic storage technique, as mentioned by TechCrunch, doesn't actually store data in the atom, but moves them around to form readable patterns. "This means that imbuing individual atoms with a 0 or 1 is the next major step forward and the next major barrier in storing data digitally, both increasing capacity by orders of magnitude and presenting a brand new challenge to engineers and physicists," reports TechCrunch. From the report: It works like this: A single Holmium atom (a large one with many unpaired electrons) is set on a bed of magnesium oxide. In this configuration, the atom has what's called magnetic bistability: It has two stable magnetic states with different spins (just go with it). The researchers use a scanning tunneling microscope (also invented at IBM, in the 1980s) to apply about 150 millivolts at 10 microamps to the atom -- it doesn't sound like a lot, but at that scale, it's like a lightning strike. This huge influx of electrons causes the Holmium atom to switch its magnetic spin state. Because the two states have different conductivity profiles, the STM tip can detect which state the atom is in by applying a lower voltage (about 75 millivolts) and sensing its resistance. In order to be absolutely sure the atom was changing its magnetic state and this wasn't just some interference or effect from the STM's electric storm, the researchers set an iron atom down nearby. This atom is affected by its magnetic neighborhood, and acted differently when probed while the Holmium atom was in its different states. This proves that the experiment truly creates a lasting, stored magnetic state in a single atom that can be detected indirectly. And there you have it: a single atom used to store what amounts to a 0 or a 1. The experimenters made two of them and zapped them independently to form the four binary combinations (00,01,10,11) that two such nodes can form.
You're assuming that different information has different masses.
"in" an atom or on it or to it. atoms want to know.
Oh no, does this mean we will soon have a shortage of atoms?
Richard Feynman's talk discussed manipulation at the atomic level as a target to strive for, demonstrating how much room there is for miniaturisation.
Now it seems that we're going to need to drop to the sub-atomic level for further manipulation.
Ask me about repetitive DNA
Where does this research fall on the Munroe Scale?
https://xkcd.com/678/
"I don't know, therefore Aliens" Wafflebox1
It sounds like we may have finally hit the limit for density of data storage. Kinda hard to get below the atomic level.
Think of the amount of data you could store in a single copper BB if the atoms could be used as memory. Holy fuck.
Ten million Libraries of Congress? 100 million? A billion?
Just cruising through this digital world at 33 1/3 rpm...
This is why I don't normally object to the volume of patents filed by and granted to IBM. It's R&D that actually leads to useful things.
They sentenced me to twenty years of boredom
That's why I advocate research into creating pocket universes, especially ones with a flow of time faster than our own. Then the amount of data and processing can become practically infinite at the point where the pocket universe intersects our own.
That's either going to bring the price of STMs way down.
Or the price of memory is going to go through the roof.
Nah. Sound like we've just made magnetic core memory with holmium atoms instead of iron donuts.
So Atom Ant is real!
To clarify what hackwrench wrote, the researchers only changed the information. They did not add new information.
A cat can't teach a dog to bark.
If information has mass, how much did the atom's mass increase once it was imbued with a 0 or 1?
Did you mean how much did it decrease when its entropy was changed?
No sig today...
I bet you're also one of the 3% that expresses fear at least once a week at losing your job to a robot.
"I don't know, therefore Aliens" Wafflebox1
We could be surrounded by alien data sand waiting to be discovered, except somebody vacuumed it up from the floor mats in their car and threw it out.
This is just retarded. Anyone storing data on something so incredibly volatile deserves to have their data destroyed.
Anons need not reply. Questions end with a question mark.
Nope. Never once. But I will happily build a robot to take your job. Just business.
Sig for hire.
We could be surrounded by alien data sand waiting to be discovered, except somebody vacuumed it up from the floor mats in their car and threw it out.
This is just retarded. Anyone storing data on something so incredibly volatile deserves to have their data destroyed.
Retarded? You seem to be. Storing or distributing data like that would be a great test. If a feeble species like ours never finds it, oh well, we were just too retarded. But if we did find it, hey, maybe we are not all morons like you after all. Eh. Well, we probably are.
Sig for hire.
You should definitely get a microscope and go start looking at all the sand! You don't want to be morons like us!
If one atom holds one bit, then one gram of holmium holds about 456 exabytes of data.
For comparison, DNA has sucessfully held data at 215 petabytes/gram.
I believe the phrase "crying over spilt milk" applies well here. If this is causing you nightmares, I suggest visiting a psychiatrist.
So what if we are accidentily destorying alien knowledge? If we cannot tell difference between the encoded forms of matter and unencoded forms, and are unable to read or use it, what use is it?
It is unlikely that the sand and dirt in your floor mats and car is special alien data compared to sand and dirt in some remote area untouched by civilisation since the aliens visited, and that the sand and dirt in your floor mats and car is not destoryed by being simply thrown out, especially if data stored on a subatomic level.
Many past wonders have been damaged and destroyed. It is a pity, but that is all. If the cistine chapel was painted over, we could work out how to uncover it. If the chapel was destroyed, we could rebuild and repaint it. All it needs is people with skill and determination. It is a pity when anything that someone worked hard on is destroyed, but it is hardly the end of the world.
It's hardly just a single atom involved if they required a magnesium oxide bed for it to rest on.
It's amazing to think that we've gone from the discovery of the electron in (? 1897) to this...
However, if we extrapolate forwards from this discovery, then is it theoretically possible to construct atomic-scale logic gates? Could we conceivably construct a lattice or matrix of atoms - perhaps held on some form of crystalline substrate, in which we could "inject" a signal in the form of a single free electron, only to have that propagate through the structure in a similar manner to the way that logic flows through semi-conductor gates in a contemporary integrated circuit?
Yes, I understand that the mechanisms and scales are completely, utterly different; I understand that the complexity of my postulate is way beyond present-day capability, but I'm curious to know if we could leverage some of the transitional states of matter to achieve this sort of thing?
We've advanced from Charles Babbage to Quantum Computing in ~ 225 years... at a steadily-accelerating pace. I don't think I'd bet against these sorts of advances in the next 225...
I agree. They are sneaky little rascals.
But I will happily build a robot to take your job. Just business
There's nothing wrong with automation and robotics, of course. However, when someone says "just business", they're trying to justify something they find ethically dubious by claiming it's OK because it's for money.
It reminds me of the line from Grosse Point Blank:
"No, no, no, a psychopath kills for no reason. I kill for money. It's a job. That didn't come out right."
SJW n. One who posts facts.
You can only read the data if you don't know the location of the atom.and the data becomes unreadable if you know the location of the atom
Is this the return of the Millipede project?
Let's hope they can get it out the door this time.
A witty
Same story on Engadget: "IBM built an atomic hard drive! It's 100,000 times more efficient than the state-of-the-art."
The good news: new harddrives will have the size of a pin. The bad news: it'll require the scanning tunneling microscope attached to work: http://www-03.ibm.com/ibm/hist...
So, now, it'll require more 10 years to work to reduce the scanning tunneling microscope to the size of current harddrives.
The problem with pocket universes is always laundry. You forget to take them out and then when you open the drier you've got universe smeared all over your clothes.
We don't have a state-run media we have a media-run state.
I would love having a robot do my job.
When can you get started?