Microsoft and UW Research May Lead to DNA-Based Datacenters

One thing we can all agree is that we have a finite amount of space on this planet. Years ago, California Department of Motor Vehicles (DMV) contacted me regarding the use of digital signatures to eliminate the paper applications for driver’s license in California. They said they have storage rooms full of paper applications all the way up to the ceilings and would like to switch to digital storage. How much paper do you think a large state like California consumes? As of 2018, California state had a population of 40 million. Yes, that’s a large population, even more than our neighbor Canada, which has 37 million people. Instead of looking at one country or state, let’s look at how much paper is consumed by 7.7 billion people on this planet. I don’t know the statistics for 2019, but I do know that according to this ecology.com article Paper Chase, in 2011 the world was consuming 300 million tons of paper every single year.

I know what you are thinking. Why am I worried about paper storage when we can now use digital storage? The reason I am talking about paper storage is because it’s easy to comprehend running out of paper. About 100 years ago, it was unimaginable to think we could run out of water some day. Today Africa is running out of water, due to population boom, climate change, and other factors. That’s within one lifetime. The cloud storage providers are offering unlimited data storage today, at a cost of course. Some day they won’t be able to offer unlimited storage at any cost. Scientists believe that some day we will run out of digital storage because we are data hungry and can’t stop consuming enough data.

Luckily, we have smart researchers who are already thinking about the future today. Microsoft and University of Washington (UW) researchers are working on a new concept of data storage – the DNA storage. If you haven’t heard of the DNA storage, don’t worry. Luke Dormehl has explained the concept of DNA storage in a fascinating article When we run out of room for data, scientist want to store it in DNA. He points out that the 3.7 billion humans who use the Internet are creating a whopping 2.5 quintillion bytes of data every single day. Yes, that’s only half the population on earth creating this large amount of data. So how large is the number quintillion? It’s 1 followed by 18 zeros.

* In U.S. and Canada, a quintillion is 1 followed by 18 zeros, while in Great Britain it’s 1 followed by 30 zeros.

Imagine the possibilities. We will be able to store a million times more data on the same volume that we store today by using DNA data storage. In addition, unlike the traditional media which can store data only for a limited period, the data in DNA storage can last thousands of years.

You are wondering how are people going to store data in their DNA, right? Well, don’t worry. The researchers from Microsoft and UW are talking about storing data in synthetic DNA that they’ve created in a lab. They are not talking about humans or other living beings (at least not right now). I can imagine some movie producers already getting ideas for their science fiction movies.

So far, the researchers have successfully encoded the word “hello” into snippets of fabricated DNA. Then they used an automated system to turn the snippets back into digital data. The automation is really key here. Without automation we won’t be talking about DNA storage. In her article With a “hello”, Microsoft and UW demonstrate first fully automated DNA data storage, Jennifer Langston wrote:

When the system needs to retrieve the information, it adds other chemicals to properly prepare the DNA and uses microfluidic pumps to push the liquids into other parts of the system that “read” the DNA sequences and convert it back to information that a computer can understand. The goal of the project was not to prove how fast or inexpensively the system could work, researchers say, but simply to demonstrate that automation is possible.

One immediate benefit of having an automated DNA storage system is that it frees researchers up to probe deeper questions, instead of spending time searching for bottles of reagents or repetitively squeezing drops of liquids into test tubes.

Check out this informational video produced by Microsoft Research.

According to the Boston-based company Catalog, in 2025 the world is expected to generate 160 zettabytes of data. This company is building, what they call, the world’s first DNA-based platform for digital storage. Yes, there are others working on this concept as well. Catalog claims that they have developed technology that could be revolutionary. They claim they will be able to fit all the world’s data easily into a space the size of a coat closet. Check out Catalog’s Web site. You will realize this is really serious business, not just a fun summer project.

If you are really interested in technical details of this emerging technology and want to know how DNA data storage works, then check out this scientific report by Christopher Takahashi. You will learn all about DNA synthesis, sequencing preparation, nanapore sequencing, coding and decoding, and DNA alignment.

References:

• Microsoft’s latest breakthrough could make DNA-based data centers possible
• When we run out of room for data, scientist want to store it in DNA
• With a “hello”, Microsoft and UW demonstrate first fully automated DNA data storage
• Catalog

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