Color centers in diamonds are something that researchers and the scientific community have been much interested in in the recent past. Before delving deeper into how they could help meet our growing storage requirements, let us have a quick understanding of what these color centers in diamonds are.
What are Color Centers?
Color centers are defects within the bond structure of a material. The bonds, in this case, imply long-standing attraction between atoms or ions within a molecule. The force that binds the atoms or ions could be electrostatic forces between oppositely charged ions. It could also stem from the sharing of electrons.
The defects within the bond structure can manifest in different forms, such as holes, excitons, vacancies, or impurities. Excitons are nothing but electrons stuck in excited states.
Color centers live as localized points in the material where bond structures have altered. The formation of color centers results in the changing of a material’s molar refractivity. However, in the case of diamonds, the color centers prove useful for quantum applications.
More importantly, the scientific community has been investigating color centers for the past few years for their improved optical properties. They found the nitrogen-vacancy center to be particularly useful for its high spin ground state with favorable spin coherence time from cryogenic to room temperature.
Recently, the physicists at the City College of New York (CCNY) have come up with a technique that can potentially strengthen and expand the data storage capacity in diamonds.
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Optical Data Storage Breakthrough: Color Centres in Diamonds and a Scientific Breakthrough
The research, titled “Reversible Optical Data Storage below the Diffraction Limit,” pivots on the technology of multiplexing the storage in the spectral domain. It implies the possibility of storing many different images in the same place in the diamond. All it needs is the use of a laser of a marginally different color. Consequently, this would result in the storage of diverse information in different atoms that share the same microscopic spot.
According to Tom Delord, a postdoctoral research associate at CCNY, the method is capable of finding its way “to computing applications” that require “high-capacity storage.”
To achieve what it has so far, the scientists at CCNY had to control the electrical charge of the color centers. They accomplished it by using a narrow-band laser and cryogenic conditions very precisely. It would be pertinent to mention here that cryogenics is the scientific study of materials and their behavior at extremely low temperatures.
According to the researchers, the method helped them:
“Write and read tiny bits of data at a much finer level than previously possible, down to a single atom.”
Why is the Breakthrough Important?
Essentially, the research shows us the way to store more data in a finite space. This is increasingly important, as the research and related developments are highly crucial for our day and age. The urgency of these developments is underscored by the fact that the volume of data we need to store has been increasing exponentially each day.
In context, according to the latest research, there are 64 zettabytes of data in the world purely in digital form, where one zettabyte is equal to a trillion gigabytes. Remarkably, 90% of the world’s data was created in the last two years. It’s estimated that by 2025, the global data volume will surge to anywhere between 150-175 zettabytes, with IoT devices alone being responsible for 90 zettabytes of this data.
Given this staggering increase in data creation, the solution developed by maneuvering diamond color centers can help store more data without the effort, resulting in a significant expansion of the physical storage space. This advancement is timely, considering the increasing requirement for substantial physical storage space in various sectors.
For example, Facebook is responsible for generating 4 petabytes of data per day, where 1 petabyte equals 1 million gigabytes of data. To support this, Facebook owns and operates 18 data centers globally, encompassing 40 million sq ft. of space. Yet, Facebook represents just one of the tech giants grappling with massive data volumes. The Google search engine processes 3.5 billion queries daily, WhatsApp users exchange over 65 billion messages per day, and internet users worldwide generate nearly 2.5 quintillion bytes of data every day. This underscores a relentless demand for storage, storage, and more storage.
Undoubtedly, the CCNY information with diamond color centers would be game-changing when brought to scale.
Past Research on Germanium-Vacancy Single Color Centers in Diamond
Similar research was conducted on diamond color centers earlier as well. The Research published in 2015, for instance, helped understand the atomic-sized fluorescent defects in diamonds as a promising solid-state platform for quantum cryptography and quantum information processing, serving as a foundational step for subsequent studies in this area.
The research tested the feasibility of using single photon sources with high-intensity and reproducible fabrication methods for this purpose. The research took note of a novel color center in diamond, composed of germanium and a vacancy, which the researchers termed the GeV center.
Another research, published in 2022, conducted by researchers at Saga University and Adamant Namiki Precision Jewelry, led to the development of a new method for manufacturing ultra-high purity diamond wafers. These diamond wafers measure 5 cm across.
With their data density, these wafers can store the equivalent of a billion Blu-ray discs. To put this into perspective, a typical Blu-ray disc can store up to 25 GB of data. Therefore, a billion Blu-ray discs would equate to a staggering 25 exabytes of data. In achieving this feat, the research utilized a nitrogen-vacancy center to store data in the form of superconducting quantum bits (qubits).
More on Adamant Namiki Precision Jewelry or Orbray
The Adamant Namiki Precision Jewelry changed its name to Orbray Co., Ltd., effective January 1st, 2023. The company has an extensive range of products, including precision jewelry, fiber optical components, and small motors. By application, the company caters to the fields of information communication, semiconductors, industrial machines, robots, automobiles, optical driving devices, audio-making, and much more.
Founded in 1939 and headquartered in Tokyo, Japan, Orbray is a privately held company.
Companies Working on the Diamond Wafer Technology
While Orbray is known for manufacturing diamond wafers specifically for storage, there are few others in the industry who have developed a comparable storage solution. Yet, it’s noteworthy that many other companies are producing diamond wafers for various other purposes. This warrants attention as these companies may also branch out into storage solutions in the near future, given their existing knowledge of the fundamental technology.
#1. Stanford Advanced Materials
Another company renowned for manufacturing diamond wafers is Stanford Advanced Materials. They offer a product known as the CVD Diamond Wafer, noted for its high-end optical and thermal properties. Furthermore, they claim these diamond wafers boast excellent physical and chemical properties. Notably, they feature an almost continuous band of optical transparency from UV to THz, making them compatible with multiple band ranges, including X-ray, ultraviolet, infrared, microwave, and more.
CVD diamond wafers have many properties that are almost impossible to attain for general optical materials. For instance, it is capable of playing crucial roles in high energy input, low dielectric loss, high Raman gain, low beam distortion, erosion resistance, and other aspects.
Stanford’s CVD diamond wafers serve many industries, including aerospace, military, and others. They are highly efficient in thermal management, especially in high power, high frequency, miniaturized, and highly integrated electronic components.
Headquartered in Lake Forest, California, United States, Stanford Advanced Materials has been in operation since 1994 and is a privately held company.
#2. AKHAN Semiconductors
Another semiconductor company doing very well in manufacturing diamond wafers is Akhan Semiconductors. In 2021, it manufactured the first 300 mm complementary metal-oxide-semiconductor (CMOS) diamond wafers. The technology was primarily developed to improve power handling, heat management, and durability of electronics. However, it caters to a variety of industries and manufacturing processes. According to the CEO of Akhan Semiconductor, Adam Khan, Akhan’s diamond wafers will help build more powerful and durable devices.
Headquartered in Illinois, United States, Akhan Semiconductor is a privately held company that was founded in 2012. According to the latest available news, the company raised US$20 million on February 17th, 2022.
Other Data Storage Solutions
While exploring color centers in diamonds is definitely a game-changing innovation in the field of data storage, the solution is yet to be scaled up.
A technological giant that keeps experimenting with new and improved data storage technologies all the time is Intel. It has multiple innovative storage technologies to offer.
#1. Intel Storage Technologies
Its Optane Technology, for instance, helps eliminate data center storage bottlenecks, allowing users to deal with bigger, more affordable datasets. Its 3D NAND technology products are known for their capacity and reliability. Its EDSFF SSD solutions help achieve improved capacity at lower costs.
Intel’s 2022 revenue was $63.1 billion, down $16.0 billion, or 20%, from 2021. The company invested $17.5 billion in R&D, made capital investments of $24.8 billion, and generated $15.4 billion in cash from operations and $(4.1) billion of adjusted free cash flow.
#2. Seagate
Seagate is another forerunner in the field of data storage, having recently introduced a significant innovation. Their latest offering is the high-performing, efficient, and durable multi-petabyte capacity block storage system known as Exos® CORVAULT™. This system’s high-density features ensure optimal space utilization, extended life cycles, and reduced power consumption per petabyte.
Additionally, it contributes to lowering the data center’s carbon footprint by necessitating fewer computing and networking resources. Currently, the solution is available in two variants: the first variant offers up to 2.5 PB of storage in 1.2-metre racks, while the second provides 1.5 PB for 1.0-metre-deep racks.
For the financial year ended on June 30th, 2023, Seagate registered a revenue of more than US$7.3 billion, which was considerably less than its previous year’s revenue of more than US$11.5 billion.
Future Research in Diamond Color Centers
A lot of research is underway to explore and understand diamond color centers better. The researchers are motivated for many reasons, notably because the color centers exhibit improved optical properties in terms of spectral stability, wavelength, and spin properties. While diamond is generally rich in optical centers, the exact origin of these centers often remains unknown. It is anticipated that future research will undoubtedly provide further insights.
Diamond wafers have been a significant breakthrough for large-quantity data storage. And it is one area where a lot of research is being carried out at present. Knowing diamond wafers more would help improve their properties as storage systems, undoubtedly.
Although for powering next-gen semiconductors, scientists at Japan’s Chiba University have developed a method that uses lasers to create diamond wafers. According to Hirofumi Hidai, a professor at Chiba University School of Engineering:
“Diamond slicing enables the production of high-quality wafers at low cost and is indispensable to fabricate semiconductor devices.”
This newly developed method is crucial for reasons going beyond diamond’s use as semiconductors. It helps develop mechanisms to control the formation of cracks through diamonds so that they can be made to grow along a desired plane.
In April this year, Amazon Web Services struck a collaboration with De Beers subsidiary Element Six to develop synthetic diamonds, which will be used in quantum key distribution. What stands out in this partnership is their method, which involves creating color centers in a diamond. These color centers will absorb photons containing quantum information to re-emit them later.
According to Antia Lamas-Linares, who leads the AWS Center for Quantum Networking:
“We [Amazon] can already do some things on relatively small scales, but to really take it to a global scale – AWS is a global company – there are a few things that need to be developed.”
To conclude, the world will see more research targeted at leveraging diamond color centers. Not all of them will help improve data storage, but many of them will. Data is the fuel on which our modern-day world runs. It is quite natural that leading companies will invest more in the future towards solutions that help resolve the exponentially growing storage needs.
Wanda Parisien is a computing expert who navigates the vast landscape of hardware and software. With a focus on computer technology, software development, and industry trends, Wanda delivers informative content, tutorials, and analyses to keep readers updated on the latest in the world of computing.
