Tiny QR code achieved using electron microscope technology | Hacker News Reader

Tiny QR code achieved using electron microscope technology

newatlas.com

41 pointsjonbaer27 comments

Some time ago, I tried to use https://github.com/alisinabh/paperify to back up some data I had in the form of QR codes on paper. Turns out the standard printer is very limiting in terms of how many bits of data you can fit into paper if you want to read it reliably. I would guess this would be the same in their case. Maybe they will come up with a good protocol with error codes that would suit their "printer".

Anyway, I like the concept of storing QR codes on paper or other medium even if it is not really practical.

> Turns out the standard printer is very limiting in terms of how many bits of data you can fit into paper if you want to read it reliably.

What print technology were you using? (Inklet, laser, etc.)

Tested on both ink and laser. There is a small introduction of error even with the laser printer and you have another error introduced by scanning. That limits how small the QR codes can be. Paper+QR codes are feasible only for very small files.

Fountain codes will work well here.

Looking at the end result, honestly surprised a QR code scanner could read it - other than the corner squares, the lack of pixel fidelity and strong outlines makes the code look melted or smudged

Points on a QR code do not have to be square "pixels" anyway.

"A4 paper sheet-sized ceramic film could hold more than 2 TB of data" Just 2 TB? Makes you appreciate just how much 2 TB of data is.

Also, what's the point of "storing our future" if it is so difficult to read and decode? How would one even know where to look for the data if it's get lost. So besides doing it for fun I don't see the point of this and how it can be ever scaled to be in everyday use.

Right. This is probably just a start though. Just as Richard Feynman stated:

There's Plenty of Room at the Bottom.

I recently wanted to purchase a 3TB harddrive. The price is not that heavy (e,. g. at around 100 Euro), but I also realised that I'd much prefer that price to go down significantly. I am still in shock at the RAM prices. That is no longer affordable really.

Despite the HN title (and while the focusing optics are similar), the structure in the article was directly milled with an ion beam (FIB), not electrons.

Yeah. I drew mario on a pin head with a fib in 2015.

Technically, this is not a QR code. Under ISO 18004, QR codes must be 1cm x 1cm or larger.

Ha! Reminds me of when my buddy in grad school drew a dick with CO molecules. It was, what, 40 angstrom long?

Good times.

Why did I see the headline and my first thought was the “Scientific Method” episode of Voyager.

That being said, I am curious what the use case is. It mentions data storage but the QR code is not really storing data (ok it is storing something obviously but not in the traditional sense).

QR codes store bits, arranged into bytes (A byte is the shape of a 3x3 square with one corner missing), so how more traditional can it get?

Anyone else expecting to be rickrolled by the world's smallest QR code?

Anybody was able to read that? Mine phone app does not recognise this as qr code.

iPhone 15 Pro (using the default Camera app) read it OK - it took me to https://www.tuwien.at/en/mwbw/wwwt/ww/ws

Ah thanks!

In a way the story of nanofabrication seems like a tale of disappointment. Many decades after Feynman's "Plenty of room at the bottom" or Drexler's "Engines of creation" and we have very little to show in a way of progress. What happened? Why were knowledgeable minds like Feynman too optimistic about our ability to make this happen?

Its a scaling problem. You can do a lot of cool things with fib/ebip etc. but the process itself is very slow and requires patience unless you want to destroy your structure via codeposits or other side effects. Kinda like the AI field back in the 80s the hardware still isn't there to really make use of the ideas.

> we have very little to show in a way of progress. What happened?

Our semiconductors have had features below 100 nm for a while (actual features, not just process node names), so that's been wildly successful.

Why nanofabrication hasn't been as commercially successful outside of semiconductors is a much harder question to answer.

Yes, of course the etching on silicon process has been refined to a level nobody thought possible. But this is more like a CNC process at a tiny level. What we don't have is additive manufacturing at nano scale. The nano assembler that Drexler and Feynman thought were possible is not panning out.

I'll have to look up that idea of the "nano assembler" that you're referring, but I'll just mention that there is significant additive manufacturing in a modern semiconductor GAAFET node, with the entire transistor being grown.

This video is a good summary of the main steps involved: https://youtu.be/xaKyDrWfHes

It's certainly not as powerful or universal as 3D printing and it might not even be "additive manufacturing" proper, but it is a lot more than just etching/subtractive manufacturing.

Talk's cheap.

The feats we've archived in miniaturisation of logic and memory is already mind-blowing, in my opinion.

But how to read it out? Doesn't that take too long?

I imagine capacity/density and reliability/durability are more important factors than read speed when it comes to archival.

great, we can rick roll people in the next pandemic vaccines!

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