World's Smallest QR Code - Smaller Than Bacteria - Could Store Data for Centuries (sciencedaily.com) 40
"Scientists have created a microscopic QR code so tiny it can only be seen with an electron microscope," reports Science Daily. It's "smaller than most bacteria and now officially a world record."
"But this isn't just about size; it's about durability. By engraving data into ultra-stable ceramic materials, the team has opened the door to storing information that could last for centuries or even millennia without needing power or maintenance." Scientists at TU Wien, working with data storage company Cerabyte, produced a QR code measuring just 1.98 square micrometers... officially confirmed and recorded in the Guinness Book of Records...
Each pixel measures just 49 nanometers, which is about ten times smaller than the wavelength of visible light. As a result, the pattern is completely invisible under normal conditions and cannot be resolved using visible light. However, when viewed with an electron microscope, the QR code can be clearly and reliably read. The storage capacity is also impressive. More than 2 terabytes of data could fit within the area of a single A4 sheet of paper using this approach...
This work points toward a more sustainable future for data storage, where information can be preserved securely for the long term with minimal energy use.
"We live in the information age, yet we store our knowledge in media that are astonishingly short-lived," says Alexander Kirnbaue (from the thin film materials science division at Vienna's Tu Wein research university). "With ceramic storage media, we are pursuing a similar approach to that of ancient cultures, whose inscriptions we can still read today..."
"We now aim to use other materials, increase writing speeds, and develop scalable manufacturing processes so that ceramic data storage can be used not only in laboratories but also in industrial applications."
"But this isn't just about size; it's about durability. By engraving data into ultra-stable ceramic materials, the team has opened the door to storing information that could last for centuries or even millennia without needing power or maintenance." Scientists at TU Wien, working with data storage company Cerabyte, produced a QR code measuring just 1.98 square micrometers... officially confirmed and recorded in the Guinness Book of Records...
Each pixel measures just 49 nanometers, which is about ten times smaller than the wavelength of visible light. As a result, the pattern is completely invisible under normal conditions and cannot be resolved using visible light. However, when viewed with an electron microscope, the QR code can be clearly and reliably read. The storage capacity is also impressive. More than 2 terabytes of data could fit within the area of a single A4 sheet of paper using this approach...
This work points toward a more sustainable future for data storage, where information can be preserved securely for the long term with minimal energy use.
"We live in the information age, yet we store our knowledge in media that are astonishingly short-lived," says Alexander Kirnbaue (from the thin film materials science division at Vienna's Tu Wein research university). "With ceramic storage media, we are pursuing a similar approach to that of ancient cultures, whose inscriptions we can still read today..."
"We now aim to use other materials, increase writing speeds, and develop scalable manufacturing processes so that ceramic data storage can be used not only in laboratories but also in industrial applications."
accelerated aging test not yet completed (Score:3, Insightful)
Re: accelerated aging test not yet completed (Score:5, Informative)
What about the future? (Score:4, Insightful)
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These were my thoughts on the matter as well. Besides that, we've got stuff from ancient times that we still can't decipher. Sure, it's readable but we don't understand what it's trying to convey.
Re:What about the future? [deciphering] (Score:5, Funny)
Zork the Cockroach: "What the fuck is 'rick-rolling'?"
Re: (Score:2)
Zork the Cockroach: "What the fuck is 'rick-rolling'?"
Zeek teh Cockroach: "Must have something to do with those disgusting Scarabs."
Re: What about the future? (Score:2)
My thinking too... the fact that current storage media is short-lived doesn't seem to me to be a big provide since the ability to read said media is also short-lived. Data needs to be kept "fresh" by migrating it to current storage means. Otherwise you end up with stories like NASA finding some thought-lost Apollo data tapes but lacking any means to read them.
If the data is important enough that it needs to be kept for centuries, then it's important enough to migrate to current data storage formats as the t
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An interesting data point is that humanity doesn't have written records older than about 5,000 years, so we have never witnessed the continuously changing communication methods used by the human race over a period of 10,000 years.
I expect that current world languages will drift so much that halfway through, the writing will already look like incomprehensible scratchings, not unlike cuneiform looks to
Re: What about the future? (Score:2)
The shifting of language is a large part of the design process. The textual portions include instructions (and leave space on the large tablets) to add new languages to the tablets, so they can be a form of "Rosetta Stone" for future generations to understand the messages.
https://wipp.energy.gov/librar... [energy.gov]
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I wish we had Feynman's insights around now. Besides the science of the small, here's what he had to say in '04 about what we have come to call AI today:
"Everybody who has analyzed the logical theory of computers has come to
the conclusion that the possibilities of computers are very interesting---if they could be made to be more
complicated by several orders of magnitude. If they had millions of times as many elements, they could make
judgments. They would have time to calculate what is the best way to make t
I can get 10% off next purchase next century! (Score:4, Funny)
I hope the webserver is still working.
Prior Art (Score:4, Insightful)
Hieroglyphs on pottery shards.
But, the tiny size does open up a lot of opportunities for tracking information and any and every product.
Wil QR codes be around for centuries? (Score:2)
Probably not.
QR codes were invented in 1994, so they've been a thing for about 30 years.
In 500 years, will there even be QR code readers? I doubt it.
For a technology to last centuries, it has to be widely used for a long period of time. Otherwise, it's just a footnote of history.
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One of the advantages of QR codes is that they are based on visible images. They'll just need a camera and some simple software.
Including a spec, maybe in pictographic form like the Voyager record's description of a phonograph, would make it very likely that someone in the future could interpret a QR code.
Provided, of course, that they have an electron microscope...
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Sure, they could do that. What are the chances they would consider that, or even find the QR code or suspect that one might be there!
We can decipher old script handwriting too, but it's not easy.
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On the one side you'll put a really big description and instructions.
The other side will have the microscopic data.
Then when somebody uses them as floor tiles, they'll alternate the sides in a checkerboard pattern. It'll look really neat.
Writing in clay (Score:3)
The gift that keeps on giving. I was idly wondering why we have Bronze age, Iron age, etc., but no Clay age, then realized every age is a Clay age.
Thought a little more and wondered when pottery was first created, and found China was doing it around 18000BC, and we've been labeling the different potteries over time and space. So in a way we do have different "Clay Ages", but it's delineated in the descriptions of the technology and styles of the main product of the clay used by different civilizations.
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In the future will they say the early 2000's were the Clay Aiken?
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If you want the epoch of the "Clay Age" I suppose it would be about 2900-3100 BCE, in the Sumerian civilization of Mesopotamia. They started writing in cuneiform script on wet clay tablets that dried and became a hard record.
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If you want the epoch of the "Clay Age" I suppose it would be about 2900-3100 BCE, in the Sumerian civilization of Mesopotamia. They started writing in cuneiform script on wet clay tablets that dried and became a hard record.
Interesting. Mythologized an eon later, "Because the messenger's mouth was heavy and he couldn't repeat, the Lord of Kulaba patted some clay and put words on it, like a tablet. Until then, there had been no putting words on clay.
—Enmerkar and the Lord of Aratta (c.1800 BCE)"
Those address the first application of spoken language to writing. Just to confuse matters a bit more, "The first writing can be dated back to the Neolithic era, with clay tablets being used to keep track of livestock and commoditi
Smaller than bacteria (Score:2)
Come visit my website!
Gesundheit.
"Tu Wein" in TFS should be "TU Wien" (Score:2)
Guinness Book of Records? (Score:2)
Smallest QR Code [guinnessworldrecords.com]
Smallest Transistor [guinnessworldrecords.com]
Lightest Black Hole [guinnessworldrecords.com]
Brightest Star viewed from Earth [guinnessworldrecords.com]
Ironically, the name of the university that made the feat, TU Wien, is not mentioned in the slashdot summary, but the Gunness Book of Records is.
Look around you (Score:3)
There is precious little information in our culture today that residents of earth centuries from now would be even remotely interested in.
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*sorry, I meant 'historical artifacts'.
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This isn't just about size; it's about durability (Score:2)
"But this isn't just about size; it's about durability."
If I had a dime for every time I've had to tell a woman that...
Great idea but who can buy an electron microscope (Score:2)
The problem they don't mention (Score:2)
The problem they don't mention is that future civilizations may not even recognize what these are, and even if they do, reading them might not be possible.
Similar to reading the early magnetic tapes from NASA, the specialized equipment required will probably no longer exist; reverse engineering it might not be possible...especially 100 or 1000 years from now.
This may be a very clever, way of making durable Read-Only Memory that can't be read.
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Durable write-only memory.
centuries (Score:2)
Data will be stored for centuries, much longer than anyone still has the technology to read it, or the interest to do so.