Study of nanoscale recorded marks on phase-change recording layers and the interactions with surroundings

Conductive-atomic force microscopy (C-AFM) has been used for studying nanoscale recorded marks with different length on the phase-change recording layer of optical disks. Through C-AFM images, a comparison of nanoscale recorded marks on phase-change recording layer under different writing strategies and writing power has been taken. The comparison can help analyze the combination of writing strategy, writing power and laser pulse width. The various lengths,of recorded marks for high density data storage have also been found out. The interactions between phase-change recording layers and their surroundings have also been studied. This study opens up a possibility to improve the capacity of data storage in today's commercial optical disks.