Digital DNA - close look at early warnings
Turning down on Moore’s law, the chief scientist at Semiconductor Research Corporation in 2018 said, “Today’s technology is already close to physical limits of scaling…Data storage just might be a modern-day problem looking for a 3.8 billion-year-old solution”. The solution is Digital DNA. Scientists could study the DNA of 1.7-million-year-old rhinoceros, so the way DNA preserves information is indeed profound. We are expected to reach our bits storage capacity by 2040. Existing methods of archival on silicon chips and magnetic tapes begin to deteriorate within 20 years. Moreover, they offer limited storage and pose health and environmental hazards. DNA, by its density, endurance and size, stands out to be the most promising archival system. Insights on this technology make me wonder about its hype and the kind of future we envisage wrapped in risk and uncertainties!
Digital DNA
Digital data is binary (one and zero), whereas biological DNA comprises four proteins (A, T, G and C). This technology intends to store digital data in fabricated DNA and again retrieve it in digital format. It involves encoding the binary code to synthetic proteins for storage and then decoding those proteins to binary code to retrieve information.
All of this is done using genetic engineering software and an error-correcting algorithm ensures data to be error-free. Mere four grams of fabricated DNA holding annual global digital information would be a paradigm shift! With 3 decades of research, this technology is sensitive and revolutionary; hence the slow pace is rational. Researchers have gathered much understanding about the process, and the cost of DNA synthesis in the labs has dramatically dropped over the decade. However, the cost of commercial DNA synthesis is high. Digital DNA will have to make a compelling commercial case to attract future investment currently directed towards establishing huge power consuming cloud storage facilities.
Hype
The Internet has aided social and commercial progress, but reduced attention span and patience are evident concerns of increasing information consumption. Instead of attempting to rectify this pattern of our lifestyle, this tech attempts to fix the future problems of mammoth data consumption and storage.
In 1988, An artist in collaboration with researchers at Harvard University pioneered coding a 35 bits digital image in the DNA of a bacteria — E.coli. Ever since, there are increasing tech tycoons from the public, private, and academia testing this technology, and there has been little but remarkable progress. It has been generative in mobilizing capital, talent in interdisciplinary fields, technology and lab equipment. In 2019, researchers at Microsoft and the University of Washington demonstrated proof of concept by encoding the word “hello” into synthetic DNA and decoded it in digital data using automation. This was their first step towards taking out the technology from lab to commercial usage. Microsoft is keen on leveraging the buzz in consumer genetics and synthetic biology, giving impetus to digital DNA. The CEO, Molecular Assemblies, said that data storage in DNA was not a part of their five-year plan this decade, but the push from the U.S. government has encouraged them to explore it. NASA is already using a form of artificial DNA to find life beyond earth. Furthermore, few other intelligence, defense, research agencies from the U.S. are interested in this technology. This suggests that the U.S. government has realised the immense potential of synthetic DNA, perhaps without fully disclosing its intentions. Jumping onto the bandwagon of Digital DNA, Netflix announced collaborations to store an episode of its German-techno thriller Biohackers on DNA. Netflix wishes to take pride that one of its shows was beyond science fiction. This indirectly hypes the tech and sends a message of being its ardent future user. Digital DNA has consistently been on Gartner reports as a transformative technology that will mandate 30% of digital businesses to opt for DNA storage trials by 2024.
If it is successfully materialised for commercial usage, it has challenging and promising careers ahead of Chief Technology Officers. It may change the IT landscape, organisational processes, and compel the existing cloud storage and cybersecurity companies to reinnovate.
Risk and uncertainties
The fabricated DNA uses exactly the proteins like any other biological DNA on earth. I can’t help but draw parallels in both fields. Experts have not yet come to a consensus on the ethical dilemmas of gene editing and designer babies, yet there is a lot of traction in the realms of DNA. In 2019 a team of scientists from Britain achieved a milestone in synthetic biology by creating bacteria with artificial DNA. Replicating this in higher-order organisms, including humans, could be a possibility in the future. At NYU School of Medicine, efforts are directed at incorporating artificial DNA into human cells. Is it safe to have global information in compact artificial DNA and then risk it being incorporated into a biological being? In an optimistic world, one may agree that such emerging technologies can cure diseases or expedite some industrial processes. They aren’t even remotely related to digital DNA storage, but, in my opinion, they have the potential to complement each other in decades ahead. Microsoft and other players position digital DNA as a panacea to data archival issues with no changes for the user in the front end. That is precisely the issue. The user barely knows or has a say in what happens at the backend, and technologies at this scale coax one to become a user with minimal choice. For such ground-breaking technologies, companies must garner users’ trust in technology by disclosure. Such communication will help techs identify vulnerable spots and take preventive actions.
It is good to realize what is it that we do not know. Today with the limited understanding of biological DNA, scientists say just less than 2% of human DNA is responsible for coding and the rest 98.5% is junk. We clearly have a lot more to explore. Recent studies explain the potential of junk DNA in curing cancer and ensuring the transcription of other DNA happens smoothly. While making synthetic DNA in the future, imagine if we apply the junk DNA’s currently unknown learning. Do we have any idea as to where this could be headed? Is it safe to create a powerful, omniscient product compatible with human DNA?
I will digress a bit to explain my perspective. Half a century ago, humankind had not thought of having a commercial use portable communication device. Today we have mobile phones for speaking, texting, and several other features like clicking pictures, scanning, banking, checking the weather, navigating roads, and what not at our fingertips. The idea is technologies collaborate. The difference is, in the case of mobile phones, the stakes were not as high as that of Digital DNA.
Cyberbiosecurity is an emerging field to address the concern of virus and malware threats to digital DNA. One can insert malware in the DNA sample to be sequenced and exfiltrate information. Simultaneously, the risks of unintended errors while decoding from DNA to digital format are still worrisome.
Indeed, it is the role of science to charter into unexplored risky territories; however, research and commercialization are two different aspects. Ulrich Beck had put forward the concept of “risk society” to highlight the uncertainties and lack of control in the event of technological failure. Forthcoming risks of digital DNA are currently plausible but intangible. Thus, it is all the more challenging to prepare for adversities. A technology once rolled out on an enormous scale would be difficult to undo later. Regulatory bodies and policymakers can definitely play their part, but this by no means gives the tech makers liberty to not have efficient tech design. Efficient design is not determined just by the ability of digital DNA to store and retrieve data but also by closing all doors for any potential nefarious act. It should be designed assuming that a user with malicious intent will definitely exploit it. So, the burden to use it judiciously should not rest upon the user’s value and should be a part of technology design. This holds immense importance, especially when the technology can make a permanent global change and leave almost no option for one to opt-out. Cloud storage systems are huge, but that protects them from exploitation. As of now, the power to make decisions rests with the academia, corporates and the government. Ironically digital DNA is a solution that leaves us with risks and uncertainties. It compels us to think if it’s worth revolutionizing?
