Optical Memory Based on Scattering from Gold Nanoparticles

Increasing speeds of fiber-optics-based telecommunications, along with a large bandwidth of data processed in data centers, have focused attention on high-speed and bandwidth optical digital information processing. Optical processing requires high-density, high-speed, and low-power optical memory that can be integrated easily with planar semiconductor technology. The concept of optical memory has lent a novel perspective to optical domain data storage. We present our approach to creating nonvolatile optical memory based on the scattering field from gold nanoparticles. In our approach, data storage is based on the fabrication of gold nanoparticles in different spatial configurations. Reading of the stored data is achieved by analyzing the scattering image from each configuration.