As hard drive capacity approaches the limit of current technologies, there’s a need for new methods of data storage, and a team at Singapore’s Institute of Materials Research and Engineering has discovered a new way to use table salt to help increase storage density. While current hard drives store data on randomly distributed magnetic grains, the researchers are using a bit-patterned approach, which organizes the grains into “magnetic islands.” They were able store one bit of data in each 10nm grain by adding sodium chloride to a developer solution used in an existing lithography process, and could potentially achieve six times the recording density of current drives, or 3.3 TB/in². Unlike Fujitsu’s HAMR technology, the technology can be implemented without expensive equipment upgrades, suggesting that it could be used in commercial drives in the not too distant future — although we have yet to hear of any manufacturers who are board.
IMRE multiplies hard drive capacity with the help of table salt
Table salt may help manufacturers sextuple hard drive capacity
Table salt may help manufacturers sextuple hard drive capacity
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