tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4503292949532760618.post2296264636459590191..comments2024-03-28T13:39:27.601-07:00Comments on DSHR's Blog: The "DNA Typewriter"David.http://www.blogger.com/profile/14498131502038331594noreply@blogger.comBlogger4125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4503292949532760618.post-54467071419383292142022-11-21T06:39:29.379-08:002022-11-21T06:39:29.379-08:00I wrote "This focus on density instead of the...I wrote "This focus on density instead of the actual economics of storing data is the bane of discussions of chemical data storage." The fact is that technology specifically for archival storage is a really bad business, irrespective of the details of the technology:<br /><br />- No-one wants to spend money on archival storage, so the "Total Available Market" is a minute fraction of the total storage market.<br />- Worse, in the small archival market a new technology burdened by its R&D costs has to compete with past-generation technology from the mainstream storage market whose R&D costs have already been amortized, so it can easily undercut the new technology in a very cost-sensitive market.<br /><br />Thus investing in archival-specific technologies may be technically interesting but it is a looser financially.David.https://www.blogger.com/profile/14498131502038331594noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4503292949532760618.post-78885003848836207912022-11-18T12:17:03.806-08:002022-11-18T12:17:03.806-08:00Off-topic for this post, but I would be curious yo...Off-topic for this post, but I would be curious your thoughts on Microsoft's Project Silica, a cold storage tech that they have been working on for years but recently (?) released some updates on: https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/research/project/project-silica/Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4503292949532760618.post-47926765833136776392022-11-14T20:29:21.905-08:002022-11-14T20:29:21.905-08:00When it comes to long-term storage proteins are pr...When it comes to long-term storage proteins are pretty unbeatable, with Maillard-reaction protein residues lasting at least half a billion years:<br /><br />https://www.science.org/content/article/warm-blooded-velociraptors-fossilized-proteins-unravel-dinosaur-mysteries<br /><br />"Although ancient DNA carries the most detailed biological information, it degrades most quickly. Relatively intact proteins can persist for nearly 4 million years and can still distinguish between closely related species. With protein residues, "the information is again reduced," Wiemann says. The polymers don't preserve 3D structure or a complete sequence of amino acids. But the compounds are incredibly stable, preserved "through deep time," Briggs says. Wiemann says they have identified protein residues in 500-million-year-old fossils from Canada's Burgess Shale in British Columbia."Tardigradehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/08897374407990627879noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4503292949532760618.post-42261902291644662722022-10-14T11:50:43.208-07:002022-10-14T11:50:43.208-07:00As a person who works in biology I've been dis...As a person who works in biology I've been disinterested and quizzical of DNA data storage. But the first part of your post, where the writing is used to record physiological processes is intriguing.<br /><br />In the vein of the non-DNA polymer I assume researchers are considering expanding the DNA nucleosides used for DNA printing? Each additional pair would double the information content of each bit of the chain. There are also tougher DNA backbones than the phosphodiester backbone, as well as alternative sugars (though deoxyribose is probably pretty tough on its own, at least compared to ribose).<br /><br />There are biomolecules such as ribosomes and polyketide synthetases that polymerize and (in the later case) tailor amino acids. This is in addition to chemical polymerization as done by most of the DNA printers. Appropriately folding amino acid chains, while not as structurally similar as DNA chains are to each other, might also be amenable to parallelization. And have the benefit of over 20 commonly used side chains in organisms, along with many other alternatives.<br /><br />I suppose DNA (and RNA) itself can also be chemically modified (as seen in epigenetic modifications), which would expand the coding or computational power of a strand. I'm not aware of electronic storage devices which can compute (though this could probably be set up in something like flash memory). While molecular biologists have been fiddling with chemically and catalytically active RNA molecules for a while now.<br /><br />I'm still not too interested in these technologies with respect to storage or data processing. But the technologies themselves are interesting.Tardigradehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/08897374407990627879noreply@blogger.com