Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

447 TB/cm² at zero retention energy – atomic-scale memory on fluorographane

zenodo.org

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

41–50 of 169 posts

Re: 447 TB/cm² at zero retention energy – atomic-scale memory on fluorographane

#41

Post by iliatoli »

hgoel wrote: post #25
iliatoli wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Each PhD was in a different country and decade. Mathematics (Pisa, 2000s), Quantum Chemistry (UCF, 2010s), Materials Science (UTD, now). The fluorographane work exists because all three converge — the barrier calculation is quantum chemistry, the proof structure is mathematics, and the material is materials science. I didn't plan it this way.

Ah, that's interesting. Different countries can be a fair reason I suppose.

Fair question. In my case, each PhD opened a door that didn't exist from the previous position. The mathematics PhD in Italy didn't give me access to computational chemistry labs in the US. The quantum chemistry PhD didn't give me access to materials science groups. Immigration, funding structures, and departmental boundaries created the path — not a desire for credentials. The fluorographane paper is the proof that the path was worth it.

Re: 447 TB/cm² at zero retention energy – atomic-scale memory on fluorographane

#42

Post by anigbrowl »

jmyeet wrote: post #3

Yeah, I've been baited by "breakthroughs" in storage technology for almost 40 years at this point [1]. I'll believe it when it's in Best Buy. Battery "breakthroughs" have really taken up the mantle of headline-grabbing research fund-raising articles so it's nice to see a throwback to the OG: storage. [1]: https://www.tampabay.com/archive/1991/06/23/holograms-the-ne...

I am about the same age and tarted loading programs off cassette tapes. The fact that I can get a terabyte of storage in a micro SD card the size of my pinkie nail for under $200 still impresses me.

Re: 447 TB/cm² at zero retention energy – atomic-scale memory on fluorographane

#43

Post by XorNot »

golem14 wrote: post #38
XorNot wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I mean battery breakthroughs are real though? BYD is now demoing 0-80% in 5 mins on production vehicles in China. The price of the 50kwh unit I had put into my house was very low. Sodium ion is ramping up too but is commercially available. That straight wasn't possible a few years ago till the electrode breakthroughs.

Do you have any pointers on said 50kWh battery? Asking for a friend.

This was the group who did it for me in Australia: https://voltxenergy.com.au/

It was under subsidy, but I got about double what I was going to get about 6 months prior. There are 50kwh units going on AliExpress for about $12k AUD outright so I think there's been another step down in per-cell costs which is tickling through.

I'm waiting for a price cut to make outright purchases a bit more affordable but with a wholesale electricity service plan adding another say 100kWh probably works out.

Re: 447 TB/cm² at zero retention energy – atomic-scale memory on fluorographane

#44

Post by dgfl »

This is a pipe dream and I’m almost tempted to say a fever dream. The chemistry part seems somewhat sound, even though that’s outside of my field of expertise. But the entire readout process is questionable, and has clear signs of heavy AI writing.

The AFM mechanism described as “tier 1” (very strong LLMism, btw) is somewhat optimistic but realistic. The fields needed are large compared to usual values in solid state devices, but I’d guess achievable with an AFM. But “tier 2” is vague and completely speculative. Some random things I noted: - handwaving that (not exact quote) “the read controller is cached. No need to read the same bit twice”. Cached with what?? If this miraculous technology can achieve 25 PB/s, what can possibly hope to cache it? More generally, it’s a strange thing to point out. - some magic and completely handwaved MEMS array that converts an 8um spot size laser beam into atomic-resolution 2D addressing? In my opinion this is the biggest sin of the manuscript. What I understood to be depicted is just fundamentally physically impossible. - a general misunderstanding of integrated electronics, and dishonest benchmarking, comparing real memory technologies being sold at scale right now, vs theoretical physical bounds on an untested idea. Also no mention of existing magnetic tape as far as I can tell. - constantly pulling out specific numbers or estimates with no citation and insufficient justification. Too many examples to even count.

I’m sorry for the harsh language, I wouldn’t use it for a usual review. But in my opinion this needs a very heavy toning down and complete rewrite, and is unfit for a proper review. Final remark: electronics is, and will always fundamentally be, intrinsically denser than optics. Some techniques “described” here, if they were possible, would have been applied to existing optical tech (i.e. phase change materials in blue-ray).

Re: 447 TB/cm² at zero retention energy – atomic-scale memory on fluorographane

#45

Post by foota »

iliatoli wrote: post #5
mkprc wrote: post #4

Sniff test: a paper with a single author and 53 revisions, listing a gmail address as contact information despite the author, after a brief internet search, appearing to have affiliations with CSU Global, (maybe) the University of Central Florida, and the San Jose State University Department of Aerospace.

Author here. Three PhDs (Mathematics, Pisa; Quantum Chemistry, UCF; Materials Science, UTD — in progress), plus MS degrees from SJSU and CSU. The gmail is because this is independent work, not affiliated with any institution. v53 reflects thirteen years of development since the original 2013 publication (Graphene 1, 107–109). The barrier is verified at two independent levels of theory with a confirmed transition stat…

Hey -- I have 0 PHDs so take this with a grain of salt :)

I had thought for a while about a way to store data that makes use of an idea that I had for sub-diffraction limited imaging inspired by STED microscopy.

First an overview of STED. You have a "donut" shaped laser (or toroidal laser) that is fired on a sample. This laser has an inner hole that is below the diffraction limit. This laser is used to deplete the ability of the sample to fluoresce, and then immediately after a second laser is shone on the same spot. The parts of the sample depleted by the donut laser don't fluoresce and so you only see the donut hole fluoresce. This allows you to image below the diffraction limit.

My idea was to apply this along with a layer in the material that exhibits sum frequency generation (SFG). The idea is that you can shine the donut laser with frequency A and a gaussian laser with frequency B at the same spot. When they interact in the SFG material you get some third frequency C as a result of SFG. Then, below that material would be a material that doesn't transmit frequencies C and A.

Then what you'd be left with after the light shines through those two layers is some amount of light at frequency B. The brightness inside the hole and outside of the hole would depend on how much of the light from frequency B converts into frequency C. Sum frequency generation is a very inefficient process, with only some tiny portion of the light participating, but my thinking is that if laser B is significantly less bright than laser A, then what will happen is that most of the light from laser B will participate in sum frequency generation where it mixes with laser A, and that you'll be left with only a tiny bit of laser A outside of the hole, so that you get a nice contrast ratio for the light at frequency A between the hole and the surroundings that then allow you to image whatever is below these layers below the diffraction limit.

In my idea the final layer is some kind of optical storage medium that can be be read/written by the laser below the diffraction limit. Obviously aiming this would be hard :) My idea was that it would be some kind of spinning disk, but I never really got to that point.

Re: 447 TB/cm² at zero retention energy – atomic-scale memory on fluorographane

#46

Post by timcobb »

jmyeet wrote: post #3

Yeah, I've been baited by "breakthroughs" in storage technology for almost 40 years at this point [1]. I'll believe it when it's in Best Buy. Battery "breakthroughs" have really taken up the mantle of headline-grabbing research fund-raising articles so it's nice to see a throwback to the OG: storage. [1]: https://www.tampabay.com/archive/1991/06/23/holograms-the-ne...

This is research...

Re: 447 TB/cm² at zero retention energy – atomic-scale memory on fluorographane

#47

Post by [deleted] »

mkprc wrote: post #4

Sniff test: a paper with a single author and 53 revisions, listing a gmail address as contact information despite the author, after a brief internet search, appearing to have affiliations with CSU Global, (maybe) the University of Central Florida, and the San Jose State University Department of Aerospace.

[deleted]

Re: 447 TB/cm² at zero retention energy – atomic-scale memory on fluorographane

#48

Post by YZF »

iliatoli wrote: post #5
mkprc wrote: post #4

Sniff test: a paper with a single author and 53 revisions, listing a gmail address as contact information despite the author, after a brief internet search, appearing to have affiliations with CSU Global, (maybe) the University of Central Florida, and the San Jose State University Department of Aerospace.

Author here. Three PhDs (Mathematics, Pisa; Quantum Chemistry, UCF; Materials Science, UTD — in progress), plus MS degrees from SJSU and CSU. The gmail is because this is independent work, not affiliated with any institution. v53 reflects thirteen years of development since the original 2013 publication (Graphene 1, 107–109). The barrier is verified at two independent levels of theory with a confirmed transition stat…

Curious if you've patented this? Very cool. The physics is way beyond me but I understand that each atom in the crystal can be in two states? And those are stable? There is no cross talk or decay at all?

You're comparing to current memory technologies but there are also some optical technologies like AIE-DDPR which presumably is (a lot?) less dense but has layers (I noticed you're also discussing a volumetric implementation), would devices based on your technology be simpler/faster? (I guess optical disks don't intend to replace high speed memory). What about access times?

Re: 447 TB/cm² at zero retention energy – atomic-scale memory on fluorographane

#49

Post by GTP »

iliatoli wrote: post #10
_alternator_ wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Have you considered subjecting this to expert scrutiny by submitting to a journal? That's probably better than getting hot takes on HN by random technology enthusiasts, skeptics, anon experts, and trolls.

It's under peer review at Physica Scripta (IOP) since March 25. HN is for visibility, not validation.

It would be interesting to hear back after this passes peer review.

Re: 447 TB/cm² at zero retention energy – atomic-scale memory on fluorographane

#50

Post by jmyeet »

timcobb wrote: post #46
jmyeet wrote: post #3

Yeah, I've been baited by "breakthroughs" in storage technology for almost 40 years at this point [1]. I'll believe it when it's in Best Buy. Battery "breakthroughs" have really taken up the mantle of headline-grabbing research fund-raising articles so it's nice to see a throwback to the OG: storage. [1]: https://www.tampabay.com/archive/1991/06/23/holograms-the-ne...

This is research...

It's always "research". I put that in quotes because any press like this isn't really "research", it's "fund-raising". It's the academic game of getting papers into the right publications, getting "street cred" by getting the right heavyweights as co-authors and to cite you, to become a "heavyweight" by doing the same thing and ultimately getting more grants to perpetuate the cycle.

Research can be interesting but so often none of it goes anywhere, it's just hype and there's a reproducibility crisis in academia. Look at the decades wasted on academic fraud and appeals to authority with Alzheimer's research [1].

Most of this media is the academic equivalent of "dcotors HATE This guy".

[1]: https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC12397490/

Post reply on HN