Interviewed by Roger Wood on 2021-05-27 in San Jose, CA X9485.2021 © Computer History Museum In this oral history interview, Dr. Albrecht (Tom) discusses his career in the data storage industry, primarily in hard disk drives and in tape storage. Tom grew up in a small town in Wisconsin, the son of a medical doctor. From an early age, he delighted in building and experimenting with various electrical and mechanical devices. This interest ultimately led to a B.A. in physics from Carleton College, Minnesota, and then a Ph.D. from Stanford University in 1989. At Stanford, he contributed some of the seminal developments in atomic force microscopy (AFM) working with Calvin Quate and Gerd Binnig. On graduating, Tom joined IBM’s Almaden Research Center in San Jose, California. He made a series of important contributions including the load/unload and latch mechanisms now universal in hard disk drives and the timing-based servo-tracking that continues to enable very high storage densities on tape. Tom was also a key player in the development of the IBM Microdrive and in its standardization and subsequent market acceptance - in Apple’s iPod Mini! In 2002, Tom took an assignment in IBM Zurich to work on ‘Millipede’. This project aspired to create a data-storage device using arrays of tiny cantilevers derived from AFM technology. In 2004, Tom returned to San Jose to work for Hitachi Global Storage Technologies (HGST). For the next decade, he led the research team developing bit-patterned media. This ambitious technology combined e-beam lithography, block-copolymer self-assembly, self-aligned double-patterning, and nanoimprint lithography to create tiny magnetic islands - one for each data bit. Tom was named an HGST Fellow in 2013 for lifetime contributions to the data storage industry. Since 2015, Tom has been with Molecular Vista working on a promising technology that combines AFM with optical spectroscopy to create chemical images with nanometer resolution. Tom is an author on a remarkable 148 U.S. patents and numerous publications. * Note: Transcripts represent what was said in the interview. However, to enhance meaning or add clarification, interviewees have the opportunity to modify this text afterward. This may result in discrepancies between the transcript and the video. Please refer to the transcript for further information - http://www.computerhistory.org/collections/catalog/102792215 Visit computerhistory.org/collections/oralhistories/ for more information about the Computer History Museum's Oral History Collection. Catalog Number: 102792216 Lot Number: X9485.2021