16 OCTOBER 2019|COMPUTERSHOPPER|ISSUE 380
SCIENTISTSAT BROWNUniversity,Rhode
Island, have discovered away to store data on
metabolic molecules that are smaller than a
piece of DNA, by manipulating the molecules
to mimic the 1s and 0s used in binary code.
Storing data in biological matter isn’t new,
as scientists have been working with data
storage on DNA forawhile,but this research
shows it’s possible on amuch smaller scale.
The researchers used solutions containing
sugars, amino acids and other small molecules
known as mixtures of common metabolites,
which are used by living creatures to digest food.
Using these solutions, liquid-handling robots
placed 1,024 dots on aplate, and within each dot,
the six metabolites were either present or absent.
Whether the metabolites were there or not
translated intothe 1s and 0s of binary information,
enough to encode a6,142-pixel thumbnail-sized
image.The researchers were able to extract the
data with around 99% accuracy.
As metabolic molecules are much smaller than
DNA, theycan be packed together more densely,
meaning theycould be used to store greater
volumes of data or facilitatesmaller storage devices.
Once encoded with information, the molecules
need no energy,which could make them more
robust forstoring information on along-term
basis than electronic storage systems. They
would also have abetter time at weathering
challenging environmental conditions such as
extreme temperatures or pressure.
Without the need forpower,metabolic molecules
could also be used to store large amounts of data
offline in aform of digital cold storage,rather than
in the cloud or in large server farms. This would
make it very difficult forhackers to steal data.
As it’s early days forsuch astorage technique
and one that’s not likely to pop intoPCs any time
soon, the researchers noted there are limitations to
the use of metabolic molecules, notably that the
storage is slower than that of electronic computers.
However,according to Brown University
researcher Jacob Rosenstein, compared to DNA
storage,metabolitedata has lower latency when it
comes to reading data sets from start to finish,
although DNA is still currently better at encoding
large data sets.
Data stored in matter smaller than DNA
Clothing that
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or body-conforming
clothing that hugs
genitalia must not
be worn”
CESorganisers clamp down on
scantily clad attendees at the next
consumer tech showcase
Government
is seriously
lacking the
leadership,strategy
and coordination
we need across the
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keepusandourdata
safeand secure”
Shadow Cabinet Office minister
Jo Plattisn’t impressed to hear
Windows XP is still running on
more than 2,000 NHS machines
Gougeyour
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SomeTwitterusers aren’t
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site’srecent redesign
It is safeto
saythat the
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practicallythe
whole Bulgarian
adult population
has been
compromised”
Cyber security researcherVesselin
Bontchevon the effects of ahack
on Bulgaria’s tax agency
To manylike
myself,my
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–tomost people –
youshould figure
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Apple co-founderSteveWozniak
isn’t aFacebook fan
HUMANSMERGINGWITH
machines is often something that
pops up in the world of sci-fi. But
tech entrepreneur Elon Musk’s
Neuralink startup is focused on
creating away forhumans to
wirelessly interface with computers.
In 2017,Musk touted the idea of a
‘neural lace’asameans to connect
human greymatter to computers. But no concrete
plans emerged, and Neuralink fell off the radar.
But in arecent presentation at the California
Academy of Sciences, Neuralink popped up to reveal
what it has been working on forthe past fewyears.
It turns out the idea was based on away to
connect very fine wires studded with electrodes
to the human brain, which would then feed back
data to areceiver chip attached to the surface of
the skull –concept images showed the receiver
sitting in apod that contained the wireless tech,
battery and other hardware sitting behind a
person’s ear –which then piped that data
wirelessly to aconnected computer.
That’s the proposed system, at least. Musk and
Neuralink demonstrated how the electrodes can
be embedded intothe brain of arat and read its
neural activity.However,the wireless element isn’t
ready yet, so the data was extracted
through aUSB-C port embedded into
the rat’s skull, which wouldn’t exactly
be an elegant waytosuck data from
human brains.
What works forarat isn’t
guaranteed to work on human brains.
But Neuralink has a‘sewing machine-
like’robot that can implant the
electrode-laced threads intoabrain without
damaging the blood vessels that surround it.
Currently,this is done through drilling tiny holes
in the skull, but Musk plans forlasers to do the hole,
making it aless intrusive process.
According to theNew York Times,Musk hopes
there will be human volunteers to put the surgery
and brain interface to the test as early as 2020.
“Wehope to have this aspirationally in ahuman
patient by the end of next year,” he said.
That sounds like abit of bravado mixed with
entrepreneurial ambitions, but Musk did reportedly
saythat “a monkeyhas been able to control a
computer with its brain”from tests conducted with
non-human primates.
Whether Neuralink achieves Musk’s ambitions of
‘symbiosis with artificial intelligence’, only time will
tell –along with the necessary US FDAapproval.
Elon Musk’s Neuralink plans to embed sensors
into human brains with the help of robotics
