J. Heyrovský Institute of Physical Chemistry
NEO
Next Generation Molecular Data Storage
NEO
Next Generation Molecular Data Storage
Current long-term archival media (such as tape and disk) have several issues, the most important one being that they are short lived forcing data to be copied between storage media every few years in a costly process which also produces considerable electronic waste. Longer-lasting media are desperately needed and DNA oligos have been identified as a major contender to be the next archival storage medium. With it, data is written using DNA synthesis and read using DNA sequencing. DNA is particularly promising as a storage medium, due to its durability as it can last for several hundreds of years. However, storing data in DNA oligos is currently too expensive due to the exorbitant cost of DNA synthesis as well as issues such as speed in writing and reading.
For this reason, the NEO project proposes to investigate storing data in DNA nanostructures. Its approach is based on producing DNA nanostructures, like a breadboard, and attaching streptavidin at a given set of locations, to either write a one if streptavidin is present or a zero otherwise. The major benefit of this approach is that all possible nanostructures can be built out of a predefined, small set of DNA oligos which can be produced cheaply and en-masse. Writing is therefore substantially cheaper. With NEO´s approach, writing, reading (based on atomic force microscopy), and editing are also substantially faster.
For this reason, the NEO project proposes to investigate storing data in DNA nanostructures. Its approach is based on producing DNA nanostructures, like a breadboard, and attaching streptavidin at a given set of locations, to either write a one if streptavidin is present or a zero otherwise. The major benefit of this approach is that all possible nanostructures can be built out of a predefined, small set of DNA oligos which can be produced cheaply and en-masse. Writing is therefore substantially cheaper. With NEO´s approach, writing, reading (based on atomic force microscopy), and editing are also substantially faster.