MachineMachine /stream

Researchers working in Japan say they might have the breakthrough archivists are praying for - a sealed permanent memory bank that will be easily readable now and far into the next millennium.

The team, led by Professor Tadahiro Kuroda of Tokyo's Keio University, has proposed storing data on semiconductor memory-chips made of what he describes as the most stable material on the Earth - silicon.

Tightly sealed, powered and read wirelessly, such a device, he claims, would yield its digital secrets even after 1000 years, making any stored information as resilient as it were set in stone itself.