A research team from the Institute of Multidisciplinary Research for Advanced Materials of prestigious Tohoku University in Northern Japan announced [JP, PDF] it has found a way to multiply the amount of data that can be stored on a DVD or CD by a factor of 9.

It is claimed the result was achieved by shaping the pits on a DVD’s surface, which are usually flat, like “V”s. The researchers say a V-shaped pit can hold as much data as 2^9 flat pits, making the development of 42GB DVDs possible.

This fascinating technology has two main drawbacks. Firstly, the new super discs cannot be used in existing CD/DVD drives. It is secondly impossible to apply the new technology to Blu-ray discs.

Thanks, Sze!