Harvard cracks DNA storage, crams 700 terabytes of data into a single gram

ExtremeTech, by Sebastian Anthony on August 17, 2012

A bioengineer and geneticist at Harvard’s Wyss Institute have successfully stored 5.5 petabits of data — around 700 terabytes — in a single gram of DNA, smashing the previous DNA data density record by a thousand times.

The work, carried out by George Church and Sri Kosuri, basically treats DNA as just another digital storage device. Instead of binary data being encoded as magnetic regions on a hard drive platter, strands of DNA that store 96 bits are synthesized, with each of the bases (TGAC) representing a binary value (T and G = 1, A and C = 0).

To read the data stored in DNA, you simply sequence it — just as if you were sequencing the human genome — and convert each of the TGAC bases back into binary. To aid with sequencing, each strand of DNA has a 19-bit address block at the start (the red bits in the image below) — so a whole vat of DNA can be sequenced out of order, and then sorted into usable data using the addresses.

Scientists have been eyeing up DNA as a potential storage medium for a long time, for three very good reasons: It’s incredibly dense (you can store one bit per base, and a base is only a few atoms large); it’s volumetric (beaker) rather than planar (hard disk); and it’s incredibly stable — where other bleeding-edge storage mediums need to be kept in sub-zero vacuums, DNA can survive for hundreds of thousands of years in a box in your garage.

It is only with recent advances in microfluidics and labs-on-a-chip that synthesizing and sequencing DNA has become an everyday task, though. While it took years for the original Human Genome Project to analyze a single human genome (some 3 billion DNA base pairs), modern lab equipment with microfluidic chips can do it in hours. Now this isn’t to say that Church and Kosuri’s DNA storage is fast — but it’s fast enough for very-long-term archival.

Just think about it for a moment: One gram of DNA can store 700 terabytes of data. That’s 14,000 50-gigabyte Blu-ray discs… in a droplet of DNA that would fit on the tip of your pinky. To store the same kind of data on hard drives — the densest storage medium in use today — you’d need 233 3TB drives, weighing a total of 151 kilos. In Church and Kosuri’s case, they have successfully stored around 700 kilobytes of data in DNA — Church’s latest book, in fact — and proceeded to make 70 billion copies (which they claim, jokingly, makes it the best-selling book of all time!) totaling 44 petabytes of data stored.

Looking forward, they foresee a world where biological storage would allow us to record anything and everything without reservation. Today, we wouldn’t dream of blanketing every square meter of Earth with cameras, and recording every moment for all eternity/human posterity — we simply don’t have the storage capacity. There is a reason that backed up data is usually only kept for a few weeks or months — it just isn’t feasible to have warehouses full of hard drives, which could fail at any time. If the entirety of human knowledge — every book, uttered word, and funny cat video — can be stored in a few hundred kilos of DNA, though… well, it might just be possible to record everything (hello, police state!)

It’s also worth noting that it’s possible to store data in the DNA of living cells — though only for a short time. Storing data in your skin would be a fantastic way of transferring data securely…

Read: Biological computer can decrypt images stored in DNA, Living organ-on-a-chipcould soon replace animal testing

Research paper: DOI: 10.1126/science.1226355

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"The Quantum Factor" – Apr 10, 2011 (Kryon channeled by Lee Carroll) (Subjects: Galaxies, Universe, Intelligent design, Benevolent design, Aliens, Nikola Tesla (Quantum energy), Inter-Planetary Travel, DNA, Genes, Stem Cells, Cells, Rejuvenation, Shift of Human Consciousness, Spontaneous Remission, Religion, Dictators, Africa, China, Nuclear Power, Sustainable Development, Animals, Global Unity.. etc.) - (Text Version)

"..... DNA - A Quantum Force 

Now let me take you to the very small. Over a decade ago, Vladimir Poponin, a Russian scientist, used light in an experiment with one molecule of DNA. Through this experiment, he discovered a multidimensional field around DNA. Light patterned itself into a mathematical equation [sine wave] when DNA was present. He discovered that DNA had a quantum field. Not only that, it was a quantum field somehow filled with information. How else could the field pattern light into a sine wave? Now, this came from a quantum biologist, not Kryon. Yet there are many who doubt this experiment ever happened, since it shows something that no Human expected. There are those who simply don't wish to look at the fact that real quantum biologists did a real experiment! They chose to relegate all that information to the new age and not to science. It's always interesting what Humans do with science, isn't it? If it doesn't fit the 3D model of their reality, then they deny it exists.

When the full Human genome was transcribed, every single chemical in it was seen. The numbers are shocking, for in a molecule that is so small you cannot see it without an electron microscope, there are more than 3 billion chemicals! The double helix is more complex than you know. This molecule is small enough to be qualified to be in a quantum state, and Vladimir Poponin showed that it actually had a field around it, even a single DNA molecule.

Those who did the Human Genome Project wanted to know how the 3 billion chemicals of DNA create more than 26,000 genes of the Human body. By the way, there are more genes than that, but I'm using the scientists' numbers, not mine. So this is what they were interested in. They did not see DNA in a quantum state. They were not looking for that, even though the very science of DNA shouts with logic that it has to be quantum. They weren't looking for that. Instead, they counted chemicals and looked for codes, and they found them in a very odd arrangement.

They discovered that of the 3 billion chemicals in the DNA double helix, all the genes were being created in the protein-encoded parts of DNA. Three and a half percent of DNA was creating all the genes. More than 90% of the chemical makeup of DNA seemed to be random. It did absolutely nothing - that they could see or understand. Even to this day, science does not see the obvious, that the 90% is quantum and the 3.5% is linear.

Today, your quantum physicists are often dealing with ten dimensions plus time (11 dimensions) in the most popular kind of multi-dimensional physics, string theory. If you began to ask them about what this all looks like, they would say the words, "chaos" and "random patterning." For this is the way that quantum fields work. They are filled with potentials instead of absolutes, and they vary depending on many factors... including Human consciousness. Someday there will be the realization there is a strong possibility that DNA, although a biological molecule, is in a quantum state. This will break the rules of "size" in a quantum state. For it actually is "mostly quantum," and even affects the spin of the atoms that enter its field. Then the next obvious question will occur: "What information is in the ninety percent of DNA that is quantum?"

Now we get to the core truth, don't we? So I will tell you. The ninety percent of DNA which is quantum, is filled with information, both esoteric and timeless. It is a quantum blueprint for everything you are and have been since you arrived on the planet the first time. DNA contains instruction sets for your life; everything from your full Akashic Record - every single lifetime you have had - to the benevolent creator's fingerprint within the seeds of creation itself. Every single talent you ever had is there, even if you don't have any of those today... the record is there. Every predisposition of weakness and strength are there. Biologically, every single instruction to every single stem cell is there.

Did you ever wonder where stem cells get their "information" to make the Human Being? It's in the 90% of your DNA, and it's all quantum. Why do some quantum DNA contain instructions to create weaker bodies? Why is it that some predispositions for disease are there? Now I'm giving you this information so that you will understand something that is coming next... perhaps the most important biological attribute ever presented. ..."

"NEW COMMUNICATIONS WITH SPIRIT" – Aug 5, 2012 (Kryon channeled by Lee Carroll) - New