Signals and their processing for extremely-high density recording

Organizers: Xueshi Yang(Seagate Research); Erozan M. Kurtas (Seagate Research); Haris Pozidis (IBM Research –Zurich)

Today, we are living in a new information era, where the information chain plays as crucial of a role as the food chain. Inside the information chain, however, storage of the information is one of the most essential functional elements. From personal computers to MP3 players, from data warehouse centers to mobile phones, data storage devices are increasingly becoming ubiquitous and a must-have piece of the digital life.

Data storage systems can be regarded as special kinds of communication channel, where signals are recorded in storage media at one time and retrieved at a later one. Signal processing and coding techniques played a critical role in the evolution of data storage systems and contributed to the rapid increase of the storage density. It is expected that the trend of doubling area density for data storage products will continue into foreseeable future and there will be increased demands from signal processing and coding techniques to deliver robust algorithms to support this trend. One can group these demands under two general headings:

1. Area density increases result in significant SNR degradation, which in turn necessitates novel signal processing and coding algorithms to meet the system performance standard set by the industry.
2. Novel approaches such as probe storage devices where massive parallel operations command innovative signal processing and coding techniques to meet the practical complexity and performance requirements.

To answer these challenges, cross-disciplinary collaboration is crucial and the signal processing community will be the main force in paving out the path to higher capacity, smaller form factor and more reliable storage systems. Signal processing and coding for extremely high-density recording is an exciting field and there are abundant opportunities for signal processing engineers to explore and contribute.

This special session consists of presentations given by prominent researchers both from academia and industry. The session will cover introductory tutorials as well as specific state-of-the-art in the field. The goal is to stimulate interest in the signal processing society and to create productive synergy among researchers who are working in this fascinating area. The session will comprise the following presentations:

Overview lecture:
  Authors: Erozan Kurtas, M. Fatih Erden, and Xueshi Yang, Seagate Research, Seagate Technology
  Title: Future read channel technologies and challenges for high density data storage applications

Regular lectures:

• Title: Simplified iterative detector for LDPC codes and binary intersymbol interference channels
  Authors: Zining Wu and Gregory Burd, Marvell Technology
• Title: Spectrum shaping contrained codes for recording channels
  Authors: Bane Vasic and Stojan Denic, University of Arizona
• Title: Signal processing for Probe storage
  Authors: H. Pozidis, E. Eleftheriou, G. Cherubini, C. Hagleitner, A. Pantazi, A. Sebastian, P. Baechtold, IBM Research Zurich
• Title: Two dimensional optical storage
  Authors: W.M.J. Coene, D.M. Bruls, A.H.J. Immink, A.M. van der Lee, A.P. Hekstra, J. Riani, S. van Beneden, M. Ciacci, J.W.M. Bergmans, M. Furuki, Philips Research Laboratories Eindhoven
• Title: Signal processing and coding for multilevel optical storage
  Author: Steven McLaughlin, Georgia Institute of Technology