Co-extruded multilayer optical data storage media: Toward terabyte scale discs (Conference Presentation)

Multilayer optical data storage is a promising approach for realizing archival optical discs with terabyte capacity for applications in enterprise data storage. We report on the fabrication of optical discs containing 16 layers from a high-scalable multilayer polymer film co-extrusion process. Polymer co-extrusion is a well-established roll-to-roll manufacturing process with applications as diverse as food packaging and high performance optical filters. We have adapted this to produce films with alternating active and buffer layers. The film is easily fabricated into optical discs with the potential capacity of several terabytes. Data is stored in voxels defined by photobleaching a fluorescent or reflective dye contained in writable layers of 200-300nm thickness separated by inert layers of 2-3 microns. We have shown that at short pulse durations of a pulse-modulated commercial 405nm laser, the nonlinear writing process within the absorption band of the dye exhibits a distinct threshold, thus promising low crosstalk and sub-diffraction limit bit patterns. Results on writing physics will be presented. We have recently demonstrated that data can be written and read using a novel optical pick-up. The confocal optical configuration for reading suggests that the drive developed for our discs could be backward compatible with earlier commercial optical discs. Studies of photostability and defect density suggest the suitability of this technology for long-term, high-performance enterprise archival data storage.