New single-molecule magnet tech could unlock hard drives with 100x more capacity — drives could store three terabytes per square centimeter

A ground-breaking new type of molecule engineered by scientists could open the door for storage technology with a capacity 100x current offerings, thanks to a new single-molecule magnet that can be kept at the requisite freezing temperatures with readily available coolants, a major breakthrough in single-molecule magnet technology.

The chemists from The University of Manchester and The Australian National University (ANU) published findings in Nature. As explained by Phys, while modern hard drives store data by magnetizing small regions comprised of lots of atoms working together, single-molecule magnets can store data individually without the help of neighbouring molecules, paving the way for very high-density data storage.

The technical challenge surrounds cooling. Single-molecule magnets require incredibly cold temperatures to operate, which have previously made them completely unfeasible, even in industrially cooled data centers. Now, a new type of molecule can retain its memory at just 100 Kelvin. While that's still an astonishingly low -173 degrees Celsius (279 F), that's a big jump over the previous record of 80 Kelvin, or -193 degrees Celsius.

Crucially, that number is more feasible in large data centers because it is well above the temperature of liquid nitrogen (77 Kelvin/-196 degrees Celsius), a readily available coolant that could be deployed in data centers.

So while you won't be replacing your best SSD with single-molecule magnet storage anytime soon, if the tech could now be viable for deployment in data centers, drastically improving storage density and increasing overall capacity. "This new molecule could lead to new technologies that could store about three terabytes of data per square centimeter," co-lead author Professor Nicholas Chilton of ANU told Phys. "That's equivalent to around 40,000 CD copies of The Dark Side of the Moon album squeezed into a hard drive the size of a postage stamp, or around half a million TikTok videos."

The new magnets have a unique structure, featuring the rare earth element dysprosium held between two nitrogen atoms in an almost straight line. Where previously this configuration would form a more irregular shape, an alkene is used "like a molecular pin" to hold the structure straight.

The molecule will reportedly now serve as a blueprint for further advances in the field, theoretically enabling better molecular magnets that work at higher temperatures.

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