Titanium Oxide Super Disc Developed

A Japanese team has developed a material derived from a new crystal form of titanium oxide. The material starts off as a metal and then turns into a semiconductor, this also changes the color from black to brown when exposed to light, resulting in an effective on-off function that can be used for data storage since colours reflect light differently, which can be detected by a sensor and used as a means of data storage.

The team created particles of the material measuring between 5-20 nanometers across. If this were scaled up to that of a DVD or BD, then you could have a disc with an approximate density of 25TB with 5nm particles. In truth, this is very unlikely due to manufacturing processes being less than optimal in the real world, there is also the fact that a blue laser produces a beam of light that’s between 360 and 480 nanometres wide, far wider than a single particle of titanium Oxide.

Titanium oxide is significantly cheaper and safer than the germanium-antimony-tellurium that’s currently used in BD’s and DVD’s. Also, since the material can change between a metal and semiconductor, it might be a useful medium for printing circuits, but more information and research is needed if that were the case.

Currently, no Disc’s have been made using the material, but the team is in talks with various private-sector companies as to possible commercialization. It may be quite some time before we hear of any products that use this new material.

The material transforms from a black-colour metal state that conducts electricity into a brown semiconductor when hit by light, according to Shin-ichi Ohkoshi, chemistry professor at the University of Tokyo. The material, a new crystal form of titanium oxide, can switch back and forth between the metal and semiconductor states at room temperature when exposed to light, creating an effective on-off function for data storage.