
TL;DR: A staff from Japan has created the biggest diamond storage gadget ever, capable of maintain as much as 25 exabytes. Although meant to be used as quantum reminiscence, the 2-inch diamond wafer is notable for being usable even at room temperature. The firm manufacturing it plans to commercialize it subsequent yr.
Japanese researchers, alongside an organization specializing in industrial jewel parts, have developed a brand new methodology of mass-producing 2-inch diamond wafers. Dubbed Kenzan Diamonds, these may very well be used to retailer as much as 25 exabytes of knowledge, which is 25 million terabytes or the equal of 1 billion Blu-Ray discs.
Unfortunately, these diamond wafers will not be changing the SSDs in our PCs anytime quickly as they act as quantum reminiscence. It makes use of a defect in diamond, known as the nitrogen-vacancy middle, to retailer a quantum bit.
This defect permits researchers to learn out the particular spin of an electron. It’s notable as a result of these diamond qubits can be utilized even at room temperature, not just below the cryogenic circumstances that quantum computer systems normally require.
Previously, a diamond wafer with the mandatory purity for quantum computing functions was restricted to only a 4mm sq.. Attempting to fabricate larger wafers would introduce larger ranges of nitrogen impurities, rendering them ineffective.
Researchers from Saga University teamed up with Adamant Namiki Precision Jewel Co. to unravel this downside. Using a course of known as step move progress, they develop the diamonds on a sapphire substrate coated with an iridium movie. They declare this new methodology makes it cheaper to provide the diamonds whereas minimizing nitrogen absorption, conserving it under three elements per billion.
The firm plans to introduce Kenzan Diamond wafers commercially subsequent yr, and it’s already engaged on growing 4-inch wafers.