Researchers of the University of Berlin, with partners Budapest University of Technology and Economics and Universita Politecnica delle Marche in Italy, have developed a holographic technology that stores 500GB of data on an HD DVD or Blu-ray disc.

The technology is based on the Microholas Project, and takes advantage of microholography, a technique that expands surface storage into the 3D by storing the data as microscopic volume gratings instead of pits.



The project aims at long term storage by utilizing periodic nanostructures in the disk volume rather than on the surface as in conventional optical storage systems. The main advantage of the microholographic approach is that it takes bit-oriented storage to the third dimension: by using holographic multiplexing tracks can be overlapped in the same volume. This way very high storage densities of more than 100 bits/?m2 can be achieved, according to the researchers. Wavelength multiplexing allows a linear increase of the data density and also of the write/read rate with the number of wavelength used.

The German researchers claim that the technology has the potential to store one terabyte (1TB) of data.