A technology that can store hundreds of TB of data on DVD/Blu-ray size optical discs has been born, and the blank disc production process is compatible with DVDs.

Researchers at Shanghai University of Science and Technology have devised a technology that greatly expands the storage capacity of optical discs by recording data three-dimensionally instead of two-dimensionally. The capacity that can be recorded with this technology is petabit class, equivalent to several hundred TB, and the production technology is compatible with DVD, so mass production can be expected.

A 3D nanoscale optical disk memory with petabit capacity | Nature

DVD's New Cousin Can Store More Than a Petabit - IEEE Spectrum
https://spectrum.ieee.org/data-storage-petabit-optical-disc

This DVD-sized disk can store a massive 125,000 gigabytes of data | Popular Science
https://www.popsci.com/technology/optical-disk-petabit/

Professor Gu Min of Shanghai University of Science and Technology and his colleagues say that when data centers that require large capacity are based on technologies such as flash memory and HDD, there are problems with high energy loads, high operating costs, and short lifespans. I thought it would be. Professor Gu and his colleagues turned to optical data storage (ODS), or optical disks, as a cost-effective long-term archival data storage solution.

However, although optical discs are low cost and have excellent durability, the drawback is that they limit the amount of data that can be recorded. In the past, research has been conducted to overcome this problem by making the recording layer three-dimensional rather than flat.

Professor Gu and his colleagues completed the task with ``AIE-DDPR,'' a material that ``took 10 years to find.'' 'AIE-DDPR' is a material that responds to light of various wavelengths, and Professor Gu et al. uses a 515 nm green laser and a 639 nm red laser to write data into layers separated by 1 micrometer. , used a 480nm blue laser and a 592nm orange laser for reading.

As a result, it was possible to record up to 1.6 petabits, or 200 TB, of data in 100 layers on an optical disc the same size as a DVD.

Furthermore, Professor Gu says that the blank disc production process using AIE-DDPR film is compatible with conventional DVD production and can be made in about six minutes, so there is hope for commercial development.

In the future, Professor Gu and his colleagues will work on improving the writing speed by about 100 milliseconds and energy efficiency by using new materials. He also mentions the possibility of increasing the number of layers in the disc by reducing aberrations in the optical system.