Parallel writing of 5D optical data via shaped voxels

Multidimensional optical data storage is a critically needed technology in the digital era. To overcome the low data writing rate in the conventional systems, we present a parallel five-dimensional optical data writing method by projecting arrays of depth-resolved voxels of different shapes via a digital micromirror device and temporally focusing a femtosecond laser amplifier. This is more efficient than the conventional approach that serially creates birefringent voxels in glass (e.g., nanogratings or oblate nanopores) via scanning an ultrafast laser while varying its polarizations. We demonstrated parallel writing of 16 by 16 birefringent voxels with eight different slow-axis azimuths by controlling the shapes of the projected light spots. Next, we demonstrated five-layer parallel data writing with 100% readout accuracy and a 1.5-terabyte storage capacity per disc. With a high repetition rate femtosecond laser amplifier (e.g., 100 kilohertz), our method may achieve a theoretical writing speed of 7.5 megabytes per second, paving the way for high-speed, high-capacity optical data storage.