The University of Leicester is to co-ordinate a nanotechnology research project into storing information on nano-particles.
Called Nanospin, the project aims to use nano-particles to build new materials and find out if it is possible to use a single particle to hold a one bit of information.
Such a medium could be capable of storing the contents of two million books in the space of postage stamp, experts at the university claim.
The university is leading a group of six European research institutions on the project, including Russian and Spanish contributions.
Chris Binns, a professor of nanoscience at Leicester University says nanotechnology appears to hold the key to future development of many technologies, including IT.
'Sufficiently small pieces of matter have electronic magnetic and optical properties that are different from the bulk material,' he said.
'In addition, their properties are size-dependent and so nano-particles can be considered as new building blocks of matter or 'giant atoms', whose properties can be tailored.'
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