The most significant upfront hurdle is cost. Genetics: A Conceptual Approach, 2nd ed.īut like all data storage methods, DNA has a few shortcomings as well. Nature Education, 2014, Adapted from Pierce, Benjamin. When strand slippage occurs during DNA replication, a DNA strand may loop out, resulting in the addition or deletion of a nucleotide on the newly-synthesized strand. These researchers envision a future where some of the most precious, but rarely accessed data, can be stored in vials of DNA, only pulled down from the cool, dark storage of the lab, as needed. Intelligence Advanced Research Projects Activity-the government's version of DARPA, but for spies-is even invested in the work. Today, other major technology firms are also working in the space, including both IBM and Google. In March 2019, they even came up with the first automated system for storing and retrieving data in the manufactured genetic material. That same year, a team of researchers from Microsoft and the University of Washington fit 200 megabytes of data onto lengths of DNA, including the entirety of War and Peace. While sophisticated machines, like synthesizers and sequencers, already help to speed up the process, the new advancement eliminates the need for lab techs, running around with pipettes. Researchers from Microsoft and the University of Washington have come with the first fully automated system for encoding data onto strands of DNA. Since DNA can store data far more densely than silicon, you could squeeze all of the data in the world inside just a few grams of it. That's because DNA is millions of times more efficient at storing data than your laptop's magnetic hard drive. But in the future, the perfect next-gen space capsule could be found within our bodies.
When the Voyager spacecrafts launched in 1977, ready to study the outer limits of our solar system, they brought with them two golden phonograph records that each contained an assemblage of sounds and images meant to represent life on Earth. To prove it, they've put the entirety of The Wizard of Oz-translated into Esperanto- into strands of DNA, with greater accuracy than prior methods.
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