http://www.newscientist.com/news/news.jsp?id=ns99993129
Digital image stored in single molecule
10:15 01 December 02 NewScientist.com news service
An image composed of over 1000 of bits of information can be stored in
the atoms of a single molecule, US researchers have shown.
Bing Fung and colleagues at the University of Oklahoma found that the 19
hydrogen atoms in a lone liquid crystal molecule can store at least 1024
bits of information. The data are stored in the complex interaction of
the protons' magnetic moments.
Fung hopes the technique, dubbed "molecular photography", could one day
be used to pack massive amounts of digital information into a tiny space
but admits that the process is currently experimental. "It's a very, very
first step towards using nuclear spins for molecular information
processing," he told New Scientist:
In their experiments, the researchers used a molecule to store a black
and white image, 32 pixels square. The image was encoded in binary 1s and
0s that can easily be processed by a computer.
Electromagnetic pulse
The researchers fired an electromagnetic pulse containing 1024 different
radio frequencies close to 400 megahertz at the molecule. Each frequency
either had amplitude, representing a "1", or did not, representing or a
"0". This imprinted the information on the molecule.
The researchers were able to read the information back by firing a second
pulse with slightly shifted frequencies at the molecule and measuring the
consequent changes with a nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) instrument.
Fung says it may be possible to store more information using the nuclei
of this type of molecule but admits that the nature of the spin
interactions is not well understood. "We know how they interact in simple
cases, but the interaction in this molecule are extremely complicated,"
he says.
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