Nanodot memory capable of 10 - 100x faster operation than RAM

They built silicon nanodot memory by embedding silicon nanodots, just 3nm in width, in a layer of non-conducting material, and the covering it with a thin metallic layer. The base layer, dot and metal layer forms a set of transistors, with each dot acting as one bit. Its state is changed by having a green laser's light positioned on the part of the metal gate layer above a dot and firing a sub-millisecond burst of hot light which anneals that precise area of the metal layer and causes a metal-gate function there, positioned above an embedded silicon nanodot below.

A paper, Fast Programming Metal-Gate Si Quantum Dot Nonvolatile Memory Using Green Nanosecond Laser Spike Annealing, describing this was published in the American Institute of Physics’ (AIP) journal Applied Physics Letters.