Scientists unveiled new DVD technology Wednesday that stores data in five dimensions, making it possible to pack more than 2,000 movies onto a single disc.

A team of researchers at the Swinburne University of Technology in Melbourne, Australia, used nanotechnology to boost the storage potential nearly 10,000-fold compared to standard DVDs, according to a study published in the peer-reviewed journal Nature.

"We were able to show how nanostructured material can be incorporated onto a disc in order to increase data capacity, without increasing the physical size of the disc," said Min Gu, who lead the team.

Discs currently have three spatial dimensions. By using gold nanorods Gu and colleagues were able to add two additional dimensions, one based on the color spectrum, and the other on polarization.

Because nanoparticles react to light depending on their shape, it was possible to record information in a range of different color's wavelengths at the same physical location on the disc. Current DVDs record in a single color wavelength using a laser.

The fifth dimension was made possible by polarisation. When light waves were projected onto the disc, the direction of the electric field within the waves aligned with the gold nanorods.

The researchers are still working out the speed at which the discs can be written on, and say that commercial production is at least five years off.

They have signed an agreement with South Korea-based Samsung, one of the world's largest electronics manufacturers.

(China Daily May 22, 2009)