IBM’s 12 atom memory storage

To store one bit of data, you now need about 1 million magnetically charged atoms, a main reason why hard drive capacity is not getting much bigger related to physical size. But in January this year, IBM announced that it stored one bit in just 12 atoms, a technology which could increase the capacity of hard disks to 100 times without increasing size.

Eventhogh IBM achieved the success in limited conditions in a lab with an electron microscope, the company believes that it can eventually use the results to bring something significant into market.

So you could see a 2 inch iPod shuffle which can store an entire archive of pop songs back from 1950’s or a hard drive with 300 TB capacity in the near future.