Crystal discovery could lead to exponential increase in data capacity

The security chips could store encrypted data written two different ways -- electrically and magnetically -- making extraction of the data more complex and so more difficult for attackers to decrypt.

If they have success developing a new storage medium, devices the size of a current 1GB storage components could hold an Exabyte -- a million million Bytes -- of data.

The researchers, headed up by professors Harry Kroto, a Nobel laureate, and Naresh Dalal, also say these crystals can be made using less toxic and more readily available materials than current chip materials that almost always include lead. The new materials would use manganese and iron instead, Dalal says.