Bioengineers Create Rewritable Digital Data Storage in DNA

Totally RAD: Bioengineers Create Rewritable Digital Data Storage in DNA
ScienceDaily (May 21, 2012)

— Scientists have devised a method for repeatedly encoding, storing and erasing digital data within the DNA of living cells.

Sometimes, remembering and forgetting are hard to do.

"It took us three years and 750 tries to make it work, but we finally did it," said Jerome Bonnet, PhD, of his latest research, a method for repeatedly encoding, storing and erasing digital data within the DNA of living cells.

Link to Article:
www.sciencedaily.com...

Bonnet, a postdoctoral scholar at Stanford University, worked with graduate student Pakpoom Subsoontorn and assistant professor Drew Endy, PhD, to reapply natural enzymes adapted from bacteria to flip specific sequences of DNA back and forth at will. All three scientists work in the Department of Bioengineering, a joint effort of the School of Engineering and the School of Medicine.

"Programmable data storage within the DNA of living cells would seem an incredibly powerful tool for studying cancer, aging, organismal development and even the natural environment," said Endy.

In the computer world, their work would form the basis of what is known as non-volatile memory -- data storage that can retain information without consuming power. In biotechnology, it is known by a slightly more technical term, recombinase-mediated DNA inversion, after the enzymatic processes used to cut, flip and recombine DNA within the cell.

Man... that is so cool. I wonder what these guys have in mind as to using this technology or ability...

"I'm not even really concerned with the ways genetic data storage might be useful down the road, only in creating scalable and reliable biological bits as soon as possible. Then we'll put them in the hands of other scientists to show the world how they might be used," Endy said.

Uh oh.. not even really concerned! wtf...

'Eh, you know know... I'm just going to create new technologies and abilities to use said technologies with no care in the world as to how it may be implemented.'

Oh well... not that big of a deal..., until the nations, or universe's secrets are encoded into a persons DNA for storage, and this person then... OMG it's CHUCK!

Chuck is an action-comedy/spy-drama television program from the United States created by Josh Schwartz and Chris Fedak. The series is about an "average computer-whiz-next-door" named Chuck, played by Zachary Levi, who receives an encoded e-mail from an old college friend now working for the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA); the message embeds the only remaining copy of the United States' greatest spy secrets into Chuck's brain.

en.wikipedia.org...

Ok, maybe not exactly Chuck... but those who have seen the show may get my point.

Have you ever seen a billion dollar petri dish? It's the one with all of the Vatican's secrets on it... I think they're calling it BiosMorphHomoGermanicus.

To get there, however, science will need many new tools for engineering biology, he added, but it will not be easy. "Such systems will likely be 10 to 50 times more complicated than current state-of-the-art genetic engineering projects," he said.

For what it is worth, Endy anticipates their second bit of rewritable DNA data will arrive faster than the first and the third faster still, but it will take time.

"We're probably looking at a decade from when we started to get to a full byte," he said. "But, by focusing today on tools that improve the engineering cycle at the heart of biotechnology, we'll help make all future engineering of biology easier, and that will lead us to much more interesting places."

Now I rarely say it, but this scares me.

Holy crap, you can imagine... people encoded with secret intelligence in their dna, suddenly it's not the briefcase handcuffed to your wrist, it's your arm..

This I can see terrible things with. Along with the good.

Patented genes are next. Right along with a (C) infringement notice in the genetic code.

Who needs ID chips, they'll just tag you at a dna level. Ha, kinda flies in the face of people who think the things they're doing today are decades old, when suddenly something not even used is trumped by something even worse.

Save me barry...

Originally posted by mainidh
Now I rarely say it, but this scares me.

Holy crap, you can imagine... people encoded with secret intelligence in their dna, suddenly it's not the briefcase handcuffed to your wrist, it's your arm..

This I can see terrible things with. Along with the good.

Patented genes are next. Right along with a (C) infringement notice in the genetic code.

Who needs ID chips, they'll just tag you at a dna level. Ha, kinda flies in the face of people who think the things they're doing today are decades old, when suddenly something not even used is trumped by something even worse.

Save me barry...

Lol, save me barry... I hope that's not a reference towards Obama.

I think it's hilarious when people create all sorts of conspiracies using old technologies... only for them to be replaced shortly after with an even scarier, new and improved version.

OMG microphones in Rocks! OMG microphones on flies! OMG mechanical flies with laser guided microphones. OMG holographic mechanical flies with laser guided microphones used to distract from real flies who hide under rocks that have microphones attached to their bellies!

Some day, you reach the bottom of the rabbit hole... someday lol.

reply to post by MESSAGEFROMTHESTARS


Lol, that is so true, and hopeful - but I fear that at the end of the rabbit hole, is another rabbit!!! oO

I'll be keeping an eye on this one to see what they do, it takes a while from inception to practical use, and we're ebbing towards that these days, with more and more innovation coming out and creating a standard. Sometimes it's fleeting, others it's something that integrates itself so well it fits with improvements. MP3's over CD's for instance, MP3's were the devils work if you were to ask CD manufacturers of 15+ years ago. now it's something people take for granted.

I'll always laugh when I hear professer farnsworth tell amy, You sound like a broken MP3.

Haha nah the Save me Barry, is from the Misfits. Strange UK sci-fi/comedy.. hard to explain it, but if you've not seen it, it could be off putting. Think Skins (UK) meets Heroes.

This could have far more impressive implications than mere covert and clandestine information sending. This is the first real step into organic computing! Just think, science will soon be able to create entire logic engines using just DNA based constructs. Why build a computer using rare minerals from conflict nations, when you could grow a computer in a petri dish using spare plant and animal matter?

Originally posted by TrueBrit
This could have far more impressive implications than mere covert and clandestine information sending. This is the first real step into organic computing! Just think, science will soon be able to create entire logic engines using just DNA based constructs. Why build a computer using rare minerals from conflict nations, when you could grow a computer in a petri dish using spare plant and animal matter?

Living computers. I believe that's about what humans could be described as in the first place. It only makes sense for us to recreate ourselves. And while many think about the strangeness of it all. ...

Perhaps "God" or whatever it was that created us, felt the same thing when we sprout. Or perhaps it's just in our genes to evolve...

Lots of angles to think about.

reply to post by boncho


Maybe that's what most people are, machines. The rest of us that can think independently are mutations. A lot of people that think they think independently, don't, though. In reality, all of our ideas at least stem from other people, and our "creativity" is just the amalgam or our way of combining those ideas, and how we choose to use them. So, is there really such a thing as 100% original idea? Not really, if you ask me. It's kind of like saying that every color in the rainbow is original, but it's really just a blending of two or more colors. It had to happen eventually. Often, there's a lot of overlap between "original" ideas. Just look at the profession of patent attorneys, whose job it is to make sure someone hasn't already through of your "original" idea.

Feral children also show us what happens when socialization and passing on of habits fails or doesn't happen. They are much like blank canvases. This also shows that people are mostly the way they are due to their environment, a mixture of media, peers, and parents, with the media affecting more people than anything else. No wonder it's called MEdia, because it often defines who ME or YOU turns out to be. Or, if you catch on, you can distance yourself and escape the disgusting sameness of conformity that is so present almost everywhere.

Makes me think of Johnny Mnemonic

reply to post by MESSAGEFROMTHESTARS


I think those researchers are taking credit for mother natures work.

DNA is rewritable data storage..always has been.

Cosmic..

So does this mean that I'll eventually be able to plug myself into a USB port and upload music into my body?

It just occurred to me that one would no longer need headphones or earbuds. The music would play in your mind. It seems far fetched, but this might happen sooner than you think.

Wait, where would the other end of the USB plug go? Uh oh... I think I'll just stick with my iPod.

Maybe as far as God is concerned, we're really just self-replicating androids!!

Originally posted by Cosmic4life
reply to post by MESSAGEFROMTHESTARS

 

I think those researchers are taking credit for mother natures work.

DNA is rewritable data storage..always has been.

Cosmic..

It's funny, because I was thinking the same thing.

Did they really just achieve something new? Or did they just copy mother nature, on some god complex trip?

Originally posted by MESSAGEFROMTHESTARSDid they really just achieve something new? Or did they just copy mother nature, on some god complex trip?

1.If the code was there, but switched off, they didn't create anything--they found it.

2. If they found a couple of pieces of code that seemed to do nothing, and they cobbled them together and got these results, they still did something, but it still isn't necessarily creation. More like repairing what most likely already existed, but was lost.

3, If they finally are to the point where they know what the programming language MEANS? (Heck, they identified "Stop" some 10 years ago, it's not that far-fectched to think that they've figured out other command prompts--whether or not they have them all. Hell, it wasn't too long back that they figured out how the command controls for making fingers work--literally: "build the finger" then "add another of the build the finger". A lot like a loop.) Then they've built a program on someone else's language--which is what most programmers do. Then they merely created a program.

4. If they are to the point where they can make their own codes from scratch, retooling the language to doing things other than the way it works? Then I'd be impressed.

Personally, think it lies somewhere between # 2 and #3--hopefully more towards the #3, so that way we have evidence of really mastering the language before building things like this.