laitimes

Bacteria turn into portable hard drives? DNA storage may break the problem of data storage

author:People's Cognitive

Can you believe it? The DNA in your body can actually store the data of the entire universe, and even through this technology, even bacteria can be transformed into mobile hard disks?

We are in the midst of an unprecedented information explosion, with an estimated 491 exabytes of data generated worldwide per day by 2025, equivalent to 200 million DVD discs manufactured daily. Especially when AI large models such as ChatGPT detonate the demand for computing power and data storage power, high density, long-term retention, and low energy consumption have become the future trend of data storage. In this context, as Peking University, Tianjin University and other research teams have successively achieved a series of research breakthroughs in the field of DNA storage, DNA storage technology may become a new breakthrough in solving problems.

Bacteria turn into portable hard drives? DNA storage may break the problem of data storage

Where has DNA storage come far?

According to statistics, the total amount of global data reached 84.5ZB in 2021. Such a huge amount of data not only puts forward high requirements for computing power, but also puts forward extremely high requirements for storage power. In order to store such large data, the data also lives in "buildings" such as data centers. By 2024, the number of hyperscale data centers worldwide could reach 1,000. Data centers are being built more and more, but land resources are limited, and building "skyscrapers" for data centers is a luxury, so increasing data storage density has become another solution.

In order to find more efficient storage vectors, the researchers turned their attention to DNA, the carrier of genetic information in nature. DNA storage is a storage technology that uses biological macromolecule DNA as an information carrier, which has the advantages of large capacity, high density and low energy consumption. DNA storage was first proposed by the American physicist Feynman in 1959. At that time, Feynman proposed the concept of molecular-scale computers and pointed out that biomolecular (DNA) computers could interact with the external environment.

In 2012, Harvard University stored a 50,000-word book in DNA, which completely stimulated a boom in major companies to develop DNA storage. In 2016, Microsoft announced the purchase of 10 million pieces of DNA for research data storage, and announced the establishment of a DNA data storage system in data centers in 2020. In July 2019, Science magazine listed DNA storage as one of the top 10 emerging technologies in the world.

DNA storage can turn bacteria into portable hard drives? Keeping Dunhuang murals alive for a thousand years?

Bacteria turn into portable hard drives? DNA storage may break the problem of data storage

Continental also attaches great importance to the development of DNA storage technology. The 14th Five-Year Plan clearly states that it is necessary to "accelerate the layout of cutting-edge technologies such as DNA storage, and strengthen the cross-innovation of information science, life science, materials and other basic disciplines".

In China, Southeast University, Tianjin University, Huawei and other countries have also carried out relevant research. In March 2022, Southeast University successfully deposited the school's motto "Stop at the Best" into a DNA sequence, achieving a new breakthrough in DNA storage technology, and published the relevant results in the international academic journal Science Progress. In September 2022, the synthetic biology team of Tianjin University innovated a DNA storage algorithm to directly store Dunhuang murals in DNA, and verified by accelerated aging experiments, and found that it can achieve a preservation time of up to 1,000 years.

In February 2023, the team of Qian Long and Ouyang Qi of Peking University published a paper in Advanced Science saying that by storing an article with a capacity of about 5KB into the DNA of bacteria, the bacteria were turned into mobile hard disks. According to the paper, such a DNA data storage system can realize dual-mode storage, dynamic data maintenance, fast information retrieval and robust data recovery.

DNA storage may help solve the problem of AI computing power and data storage power.

Bacteria turn into portable hard drives? DNA storage may break the problem of data storage

As we all know, computing power, algorithms, and big data are the three core cornerstones of artificial intelligence. The reason why ChatGPT has attracted attention is that it is a large model that effectively combines big data, large computing power and strong algorithms. In terms of data requirements, GPT-3 has 175 billion parameters, and GPT-4 parameters are said to have 100 trillion. Greater data demand means higher requirements for data storage capacity, that is, data storage capacity. In order to meet the needs of computing power, it is also necessary to have strong data storage capabilities. Only when data is "well stored", computing power is "calculated quickly", and the network is "transmitted steadily" can the quality level of digital infrastructure be continuously consolidated.

As a physical carrier of computing power, building a data center is one of the main means. According to data, the total computing power consumption of ChatGPT is about 3640PF-days (that is, if it is calculated 10 quadrillion times per second, it takes 3640 days to calculate), and it takes 7~8 data centers with an investment scale of 3 billion and a computing power of 500P to support operation. However, model training in a data center consumes network bandwidth and power resources. According to estimates, an average of about 13 million unique visitors used ChatGPT per day in January, and the daily electricity bill was around $50,000.

"Data centers are being built all over the world, and the energy consumption of data centers is staggering. Due to its high storage density and low energy processing, DNA storage is regarded as a potential storage technology and a new opportunity to meet the challenges of data storage growth. Yuan Yingjin, an academician of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, said.

Therefore, in order to develop ChatGPT AI models, it is faced with the need for diversified means to solve the problems of computing power and data storage power. "We're stuck right now... But quantum computing can solve it, and then there's DNA storage. We have so many cells in our body that each cell stores the level of a medium-sized library. Add up all the data from humans up to today, and if you put it in DNA, then 200 kilograms is enough. Dr. Chen Gen, a well-known science and technology writer, said.

Bacteria turn into portable hard drives? DNA storage may break the problem of data storage

How is DNA storage transforming?

The principle by which DNA stores genetic information is not complicated. DNA consists of four bases, adenine (A), guanine (G), thymine (T), cytosine (C), forming a double helix structure, which corresponds to each other in pairs, which can preserve the genetic information of the organism.

In the digital world, whether images, music or movies, when saved on a computer or hard disk, they need strings encoded as "1" and "0". When it needs to be turned on, the computer reads the strings and decodes them.

DNA digital storage is to change the strings of "1" and "0" originally recorded on the computer hard disk to record on the base pairs of DNA, and different bases correspond to different strings, such as: A corresponds to 00, C corresponds to 01, G corresponds to 10, T corresponds to 11. In this way, our human-readable information is transformed into sequences of DNA. When we need to read the data, we extract the DNA molecule from the test tube, read the sequence of the DNA, and "decode" it into the data that is usually used. This process is encoding-DNA synthesis-sequencing-decoding.

What is the charm of DNA storage?

Bacteria turn into portable hard drives? DNA storage may break the problem of data storage

01High storage density

DNA storage density is large, occupies small space, and can reach 100 times or 1000 times the traditional storage density. Each gram of DNA can store 215 petabytes of data, which is equivalent to the storage capacity of 220,000 1T hard drives. 1 kilogram of DNA can store 2×1024 bits, which is equivalent to 109 kilograms of flash memory made of silicon. The Harvard University study found that the storage density of E. coli is about 1019 bits per cubic centimeter, and by calculation, a year's worth of data around the world can be stored in a DNA cube with a side length of 1 meter. A more vivid example is that a high-definition movie can be stored in a space smaller than a sugar cube.

02Long storage time

The U disks, portable hard disks, solid-state drives, etc. we use daily will degrade over time. For example, after the mechanical hard disk is stored in the data, it can be stored in a static room temperature environment for 100 years. However, in actual use, due to vibration, collision, drop, and disturbance and demagnetization of strong magnets. The life of HDDs is usually 4-7 years. While DNA has a half-life of more than 500 years, horse DNA stored in permafrost can still be sequenced after 700,000 years. DNA can be stored for thousands of years at room temperature (20 ° C), and even tens of thousands of years in a 9.3 ° C environment. In contrast, DNA is kept for a very long time.

03Lower energy consumption

In 2021, the annual power consumption of mainland data centers was 216.1 billion kWh, accounting for about 2.6% of the country's total electricity consumption. This is equivalent to two Three Gorges annual power generation (1118 kWh in 2020), which is equivalent to burning 72 million tons of standard coal. The world's largest data center is "The Citadel" in Nevada, USA, with about 670,000 square meters of space. The largest data center in mainland China covers an area of about 590,000 square meters, equivalent to the size of 110 football fields. None of this is needed if DNA is stored. How low is the cost of DNA storage? Although the process of synthesizing DNA and sequencing DNA requires specific equipment power, if it is only stored for a long time, it can be stored directly at room temperature, and even the refrigerator is not required. Therefore, the energy consumption required for its storage is extremely low, and the cost of land occupation can be said to be close to zero.

Bacteria turn into portable hard drives? DNA storage may break the problem of data storage

DNA storage shows the advantages of extraordinary large capacity, low energy consumption, and simple storage, and is a very promising information storage technology. Not only can it solve the current challenges of digital data storage and push data to play more as a factor of production, but it can also provide a completely new way to preserve and protect our cultural heritage and other important digital information.

However, at present, DNA information storage still faces three major challenges: high cost of information storage, slow information reading and writing speed, and inefficient docking with existing information systems. However, it is believed that with the advancement of scientific research, in the future, DNA storage is still possible to achieve further breakthroughs, help solve the problems of computing power and data storage power faced by the development of AI large models, and lead a new information revolution.

Responsible editor: Fang Yujie

Executive Producer: Li Hongmei

Reference:

1. "Computing power restricts the large-scale application of ChatGPT, which can be solved by quantum computing and DNA storage" surging news

2. "Major breakthrough in DNA storage can keep information for thousands of years", Xiamen Evening News

3. "DNA Storage Technology Leaps Through the Times" surging news

4. "Fan Chunhai, Academician of the Chinese Academy of Sciences: DNA Big Data Storage, Let IT-BT Blend Burst Out Unlimited Potential" Daily Economic News

5. "The arrival of the king of storage, a breakthrough in DNA storage technology, can save information for thousands of years at room temperature!" 》Science and Technology Mingcheng

6. 《Information stored in DNABacteria into portable hard disk? Beijing Youth Daily

7. "Computing power network family, how to form CP for storage and calculation?" China Electronic News