Copies of the Magna Carta, the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and the King James Bible have now been digitally stored on a piece of glass known as a "Superman memory crystal" that has the capacity to save huge amounts of information for up to 13.8 billion years, researchers say.
Using a method of laser etching, researchers at the University of Southampton, in the United Kingdom, archived these documents, along with Isaac Newton's scientific treatise "Opticks," on coin-size pieces of glass. These tiny discs can survive for billions of years at temperatures of 374 degrees Fahrenheit (190 degrees Celsius). And at room temperature, they can last virtually forever, the researchers said.
"It is thrilling to think that we have created the technology to preserve documents and information and store it in space for future generations," Peter Kazansky, a professor at the university's Optoelectronics Research Centre, said in a statement. "This technology can secure the last evidence of our civilization; all we've learnt will not be forgotten." [Science Fact or Fiction? The Plausibility of 10 Sci-Fi Concepts]
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