The invention refers to an ultrafast quench based nonvolatile bistable device which consists of an active material on a passive or active substrate which changes its physical properties, after exposure to a sufficiently temporally short external perturbation causing an ultrafast quench. The perturbation can be from an external ultrashort laser pulse or ultrafast electrical pulse from an electrooptic device or any other generator of ultrashort pulses. This change of the materials properties can be detected as a change of optical properties or electrical resistance. The dielectric properties can be reverted back to their original state by the application of a heat pulse applied by an electrical heater within the device or an external laser.