2007-11-03 Manufacturing News

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Holographic data storage media for professional archiving

First holographic data storage media products with 300 gigabytes of storage capacity reach market readiness from InPhase Technologies and Bayer MaterialScience.

The demand for media capable of storing ever-increasing volumes of digital data is on the rise worldwide. Television technology is one significant factor promoting this trend thanks to the introduction of high-definition formats. Magnetic tapes are used to archive not only material of this kind, but also conventional film programs.

However to ensure secure storage over a long period of time, the tapes must frequently be recopied in a process that is time consuming and expensive, particularly when enormous volumes of data are involved. Although high-powered hard drives these days have memories of up to a terabyte, equal to 1,000 gigabytes, they usually only last a few years. Similarly, Blu-ray discs and HD-DVDs do not have enough storage space for this application. Television stations and archive system suppliers have therefore been searching for alternatives for some time.

The new Tapestry* 300r data discs from InPhase - Result of a development partnership between InPhase Technologies and Bayer MaterialScience. Click Here for High resolution image. photo: Bayer MaterialScience

One solution to the problem could be provided by holographic data storage media made by InPhase Technologies Inc., a start-up based in Longmont, Colorado, U.S.A. Under a joint development agreement, Bayer MaterialScience is collaborating with InPhase to engineer materials that can permanently store digital information holographically. Data carriers with a capacity of 300 gigabytes are currently being developed to market-readiness and are expected to be launched on the professional archiving market very soon.

"A great advantage of these data media is their easy handling. They don't take up any more space than a CD or DVD, but offer a lot more storage capacity," says Dr. Thomas Facke, a holographic media expert at Bayer MaterialScience. "With a service life of many, many years, they are a very attractive alterative for long-term archiving." The Tapestry* 300r data disc from InPhase is a "write once, read many" (WORM) product. "We are planning to mass produce the necessary read-write devices starting in 2008. In the future, we want to develop rewritable formats as well as media with capacities of 800 gigabytes and 1.6 terabytes," says Liz Murphy, Vice President of Marketing at InPhase Technologies. "However, our focus for these storage media will continue to be on the field of professional archiving."

* Tapestry is an applied trademark of InPhase Technologies.

Read a recent press release about - At the World of Health IT annual congress, Royal Philips Electronics unveiled CliniScape, its first mobile clinical assistant handheld wireless medical device.

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