Holographic storage refers to the use of laser light patterns to store information in three dimensions on a film-like support. The technique offers the potential for the storage of massive amounts of information in physically small areas and to retrieve data faster and more efficiently than is currently possible.

A major advantage of holographic data storage versus conventional storage technologies concerns the speed at which the data can be retrieved. Currently, information is retrieved by searching for its storage location--its sector address on the disk--not by the content of the data. In contrast, holographically stored data can be examined based on the optical pattern created by the data when it was stored. Data can be compared without having to actually retrieve the data. For large databases, the process of data mining thus becomes much faster with the holographic storage technology.

Theoretically, it is possible to store...