(PhysOrg.com) -- Using the worlds fastest light source --
specialized X-ray lasers -- scientists at the University of
Colorado Boulder and the National Institute of Standards and
Technology have revealed the secret inner life of magnets, a
finding that could lead to faster and smarter computers. Using a
light source that creates X-ray pulses only one quadrillionth of
a second in duration, the Boulder team was able to observe how
magnetism in nickel and iron atoms works, and they found that
each metal behaves differently. One quadrillionth of a second is
a million times faster than one billionth of a second. The
results of the study were published online this week by the
Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. Six of the
studys 19 co-authors are located at CU-Boulder. Many technology
experts believe that next-generation computer disk drives will
use optically-assisted magnetic recording to achieve much higher
drive capacities, according to NIST scientist Tom Silva, who
worked with CU-Boulder physics p