Microwires were invented in the old Soviet Union for military applications. These wires are three to five times thinner than a human hair, and have a metal body (1-20 micrometer) and a glass coating (about 5-20 micrometer). The wires are flexible, and can be bent into any shape desired. The metal body conducts electricity, while the glass coating acts as a insulator. Recently, a lot of research has been focussed on microwires, especially on its ability to carry and possibly store data as well! A research team at the University of the Basque Country has launched a project that uses microwires as a system for storing information. The microwires become possible substitutes for the CD-ROM.

Microwire (Courtesy: University of the Basque Country)The researchers exploit a property found in cylindrical, bamboo-like structures like microwires: they become magnetised when subjected to a magnetic field. The two orientations of the magnetisation (north and south poles) can be interpreted as the 1 and the 0 of a digital system. This is similar to how hard-drives store data. A piece of microwire 10 cm long, can then store about 10 million bits (10 Mbits) of data. The wire can then be (possibly) wound in a spool/platter of some kind, which would be able to store giga-bytes of information!
Some practical problems remain. Noise is a big factor during the reading of data. Also, heat and/or light can destroy the data stored. However, researchers are confident they can overcome these problems, and develop a system that could, in principle, exceed the capacity of a modern CD-ROM.