Sony, Tohoku University Look Beyond Blu-Ray

Posted 07/27/2010 at 6:16am | by Paul Lilly

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While we sit and wait for downloadable and streaming content to fully replace optical media, Sony, with the help of some talented folk at Tohoku University, is already working on the next iteration of Blu-ray. Those involved say that by harnessing a blue-violet laser, a disc could come crammed with up to 50 full-length movies or an entire TV series.

"This latest successful development is an all-semiconductor laser picosecond pulse source with a laser wavelength of 405 nanometers (1nm = one billionth of a meter) in the blue-violet region," Sony explains. "It is capable of generating optical pulses in the ultra-fast duration of 3 picoseconds (1 picosecond = one-trillionth of a second), with ultra-high output peak power of 100 watts and repetition frequency of 1GHz."

We love it when companies talk all geeky to us, and there's plenty of nerd-speak in the full press release. Put into plain English, this latest blue-violet laser is more than a hundred times stronger than the world's highest output value for conventional blue-violet, and barring any setbacks, will succeed the current Blu-ray format in the coming years.

Image Credit: Sony