Hello,
I would like to present you the topic of DNA computing. The idea of using DNA for computational processes was already suggested by Richard Feynman in 1961. Since then it became a broad research domain. Article's autors describe their solution which selects and displays in the seven-segmented display the result of computation of two input variables.
Additional materials about DNA computers and above project you can find on MIT and ScienceNordic portals.
What do you think about DNA computing idea? May it be a real competition to silicone technology?
Do you see any threats in it (or maybe on the contrary, it can benefit a lot)?
Do you know any other technologies and ideas that can be a replacement for silicon?
Links:
http://www.nature.com/articles/ncomms10089
https://www.technologyreview.com/s/534721/what-can-dna-based-computers-do/
http://sciencenordic.com/scientists-build-most-advanced-dna-computer-date
1. What do you think about DNA computing idea? May it be a real competition to silicone technology?
ReplyDeleteIt is pretty though subject and I am not a specialist in DNA related subjects, so again like during last week it is hard to understand completely new subject and give any opinion on it.
I understand that it is something called bioinformatics right now and even in Poland since few years people can study this subject.
I think that it is idea worth further development and it is possible to replace silicone technology with DNA computing or other technologies.
2. Do you see any threats in it (or maybe on the contrary, it can benefit a lot)?
As I noticed the computer is a probabilistic - the result of each action we get only with a certain probability. So the result is not 100% correct or even close to this correctness. I think it is a threat if we will only base on this results. This may be just an alert for researchers, that they should work in this direction but they need more assurance to assume that it is absolutely correct.
3. Do you know any other technologies and ideas that can be a replacement for silicon?
I know that IBM is investing big in exotic forms of carbon as a way to recraft chips. The example of it is graphene and another is carbon nanotubes. Both forms of carbon could help push miniaturization further than what's possible with conventional silicon and processors could get faster.
There is also spintronics but is a more radical approach. It is amazingly energy efficient. Or another idea is quantum computing.
Hi Cezary,
Deletethank you for sharing your opinion. I am not a specialist in this subject too, but I found it interesting and worth to read more about :)
Emila thanks very much for these interesting materials. I have just read all three articles because this topic is fascinating for me. I have never read before enough to try to understand what is the DNA computers. You articles bring me to understand a little closer this area. I am geek and all new technology fascinates me a lot.
ReplyDeleteFirstly I would like to say that DNA computers will never (that means for me for next 10 years) be a real competition to silicon computers because these computers are made for different things.
Secondly DNA computers are still in development and nobody knows which technology wins.
Finally I hope this technology will be used to seek and destroy some illnesses not only outside our body but in the future DNA computers will be so small and so smart to explore our body inside and there they will be able to find something different.
I reckon this technology to very, very perspective and hopeful.
Hi,
DeleteThank you for your answer. I am glad you like the articles. I agree with you, that DNA computers are aimed to perform different computations (for different purposes) than our "standard" technology.
May it be a real competition this silicone technology?
ReplyDeleteAccording to me only as more centers will take care of the technology. but (of course not to all applications.) I'm not saying that will replace completely.
The bacteria Halobacterium halobium contain chemicals that after irradiation of a specific type of light changing its internal structure. Under the influence of other, well-defined type of light, these compounds back to the previous state. It is a computer protein. I do not follow its development and research on the subject.
It's very interesting what you wrote about Halobacterium halobium bacteria. I'll search a bit about it. Thanks!
DeleteHello, thanks for interesting materials. I am not familiar with this area but I think it can be something what we should treat as an additional impact in technological development. I am not sure can we talk about DNA computers in category of replacement for silicon computers. But for sure they can be competition for them as you wrote in first question. Do not forget about other indicators like price and so on. Each technology has its own pros and cons. Silicon computers were tested in last decades in production environment. I am agree with ZC opinion.
ReplyDeleteHi!
DeleteI absolutely agree with you, that silicone technology is tested and broadly used for years and may not be easy to replace (if ever will be), at least in the nearest future. Now, the costs and the early stage of the research still place DNA computers more in the area of dreams and future plans :) but who knows how it will look in 50 years ;)
DNA computing was first demonstrated in 1994 by Leonard Adleman who encoded and solved the travelling salesman problem, a math’s problem to find the most efficient route for a salesman to take between hypothetical cities, entirely in DNA. Since its inception, the technology has progressed at great speed. DNA computation has enormous future potential. Its huge storage capacity, low energy cost, ease of manufacturing that exploits the power of self-assembly and its easy affinity with the natural world are an entry to nano scale computing, possibly through designs that incorporate both molecular and electronic component. There are many challenges, of course, that need to be addressed so that the technology can move forward from the proof-of-concept to real. But a century of traditional computer science research is well placed to contribute to developing DNA computing through new programming languages, abstractions, and formal verification techniques – techniques that have already revolutionized silicon circuit design, and can help launch organic computing down the same path.
ReplyDeleteThanks for your answer! As you described, research on this technology is conducted for many years already, different approaches are developed, but as you mentioned it still faces many challenges.
DeleteI must say that is quite interesting topic I didn't read all you article (only first one). And really I think that silicon is very reliable technology and I would be very hard to find some competitor for it.
ReplyDeleteI think that every new technology which can be some sort of competitor for exisiting one it also big plus and huge benefit for all of us. Especially that we don't know which technology can we this duel.
If we are talking about any other alternatives for silicon we have to know that Intel want to relase 7nm processors without silicon (http://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2015/02/intel-forges-ahead-to-10nm-will-move-away-from-silicon-at-7nm/ and http://wccftech.com/intel-abandoning-silicon-7nm/). Will they manage it ? We will see in 2020 :-)
Hi Tomasz,
Deletethank you for sharing your opinion. The articles, you mentioned, are very interesting. Especially, because the technology presented there can be used in a combination with the silicone technology and it can be manufactured in the same way, which I think will not influence the costs (that much). And as an author of the second article said, we are still waiting for the "after silicon" technology.
Correct me if I'm wrong, but I can see an analogy of the DNA calculator presented in the article in Nature to some simple neural network: both get binary (Boolean) input and select output from well-known set of solutions. Unfortunately figures in the article are quite unclear to me. Obviously the colored lines are some kind of peptides that code input but I'm not sure how they combine into the three-way-junction.
ReplyDeleteAccording to the articles DNA computing may be used to build robots for diagnostic purposes and they have some limitations in computing - they tend to store large amount of data though. I think they won't be a competitor to silicon, rather a supplement.
I'm not particularly interested in hardware so I'm not aware if there's any good replacement for silicon.
Hi Mikołaj!
DeleteYes, you are absolutely right :)
It seems that DNA computing will be mostly used in medicine.
What do you think about DNA computing idea? May it be a real competition to silicone technology?
ReplyDeleteAlthough I have read about DNA computing for the first time I think that combining computers and biology is an interesting approach. We have many algorithms like genetic algorithms, ants algorithms and many more solutions which was inspired by biology and nature. I think it may be used in many fields but rather as complementation of silicon technology than replacement.
Do you see any threats in it (or maybe on the contrary, it can benefit a lot)?
I can't see any threats in it at the moment. As I wrote before it can complement normal silicon technology where it performs better. It can improve biological computations and help in some medical issues.
Do you know any other technologies and ideas that can be a replacement for silicon?
I don't know any other ideas but technology industry is growing so fast that for sure if there is no other replacement for silicon, it will be invented in a while.
Hi,
Deletethank you for your answer. I agree, we need to wait a little more to figure out what technology will be used the most often.
It is a very interesting topic. I have to admit I have heard about DNA computing for the first time reading these articles. I am not very familiar with this idea and I think I don't utterly understand it, however, it may be some kind of a competition to the silicone approach. This depends on the cost of implementation of this technology, I think. At the moment I can't see any threats. It is too early to name them. Unfortunately, I cannot name any other technologies which may replace silicone.
ReplyDeleteHi Katarzyna,
DeleteI am glad you like the presented topic. Thanks for you answer! :)
- What do you think about DNA computing idea? May it be a real competition to silicone technology?
ReplyDeleteNoone knows it. Only reliable researches can show how it refers to silicone technology. In my opinion it would be slower than silicon is. Although silicon is today the most popular technology in processor manufacturing, it isn’t the best technology now. Engineers found better semiconductor: graphene.
- Do you see any threats in it (or maybe on the contrary, it can benefit a lot)?
I think it may be a significant benefit for people. Such technology can be used not only in computer science but also and above all in medicine. It can help for example better understand DNA processes and protect against DNA complications. On the other hand – as other inventions – it can be used in a bad way. Personally I believe that it depends on human approach.
- Do you know any other technologies and ideas that can be a replacement for silicon?
Yes, of course. Instead of silicon can be used graphene. It is a ten times faster semiconductor than silicon. Graphene is produced from the coal. Its production is much cheaper than silicon however factories are not adapted to produce processors using graphene technology. Unfortunately we need to wait for it…
Hi Damian,
DeleteI agree with you, that almost every invention and research can bring positives and negatives, depending, how it is used.
I also heard about graphene. As you said, we just need to wait to see if it will be a revolution in technology.
Thanks for your answers :)
What do you think about DNA computing idea? May it be a real competition to silicone technology?
ReplyDeleteI'm still counting on graphene over anything. Researchers tend to try everything on everything. It's good, sometimes they are inventing a real thing, but in this particular case, I don't think so.
Do you see any threats in it (or maybe on the contrary, it can benefit a lot)?
I don't have enough knowledge to elaborate about it. In prototype phase it's not harmful for sure. Who knows, how it will end?
Do you know any other technologies and ideas that can be a replacement for silicon?
Graphene, which is a bit hard to implement on massive scale. Maybe we need more time, maybe we are looking at an idea which will never succeed. Silicon is known for decades, we are familiar with it. However, it's an old technology and we should find proper replacement in the nearest future to make further improvements in electronics.
Hi Mateusz,
Deletegraphene seems to be very promising technology. I have read a bit about the possibilities it has. I think we just have to wait and see if it succeed :)
If you study literature you probably aware that there are human limits that shall not be passed to each concussions human being. However this didn't stop human to recognize complete human genome. Are we ready to construct same thing in the computer world? There are so many other computer architecture models. It is hard to discover useful information in the internet about DNA architecture but if you are aware of good books on this subject I would appreciate it.
ReplyDeleteWhat do you think about DNA computing idea? May it be a real competition to silicone technology?
ReplyDelete- Personally, I think that DNA computing, due to the fact that it is still in the early stage of research, unlikely will replace the traditional computers in the near future. As presented in the article published in Technology Review, this most probably in more than 10 years time might have an application in medicine. However due to the enormous capacity of data storage in the DNA chains, DNA computers might be a game changer in the data centre industry.
Do you see any threats in it (or maybe on the contrary, it can benefit a lot)?
- As depicted in my answer to the previous question, I find this technology as one with high potential to be developed further. Especially for storing data.
Do you know any other technologies and ideas that can be a replacement for silicon?
- Quantum computing and mentioned earlier by colleagues graphene.
I found the article extremely interesting, as I am not very familiar with this topic. In order to fully answer the questions I would have to do more extensive reasearch with regards to this subject. Nevertheless, I think that DNA computing is technology wit great potential. Time will show which scientific disciplines might benefit from it the most and whether it can be real competition to silicone technology or not.
ReplyDeleteHey, as some of our colleagues have already mentioned DNA computing is not a new invention and some research has already been done in this area. Even though there exist working DNA computers, it seems that still most scientists focus on the silicone counterpart. It seems to me that people are more exited about the quantum computer and we could sooner see more breakthroughs in this field than the DNA one. I might be wrong however since creating a stable quantum computer is still a very hard task (mainly due to quantum decoherence) and there is no existing one yet, or at least not publicly known. ;)
ReplyDelete1. Computer DNA - about this idea 10 years ago, said many scientists working in theoretical physics. The words of the the physicists often caused ironic smile. I am very happy when I read that this problem is already moved in the group specialists. In my opinion, for the next 10 years, this technology will be applied.
ReplyDelete2. I can not identify any threats but I am sure they are - as everywhere. ..
3. I agree with the previous speakers. The technology of graphene seem very promising. The work on quantum computers are also very advanced.