The DNA method from Jurassic Park became a reality

Inspired by Jurassic Park, scientists have developed a method of preserving DNA in an amber-like structure. In this way, not only genomes but also images and music can be stored.

In Steven Spielberg's famous movie, scientists used DNA that had been stored in amber for millions of years to bring dinosaurs back to earth.

Starting from this idea, Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) researchers have preserved DNA in a glass-like polymer that resembles amber.

Current preservation methods require freezing temperatures and large amounts of energy. With the new technique, DNA can be preserved at room temperature without being damaged by heat or humidity.

MIT researchers have previously succeeded in preserving DNA in a chemical compound called silicon dioxide. However, the preservation process takes days, and dangerous substances must be used to remove the DNA from the compound.

"Freezing DNA is the number one way to preserve it, but it is very expensive and not scalable," adds James Banal, author of the study published June 12 in the Journal of the American Chemical Society:

I think our new preservation method is a technology that could drive the future of storing digital information in DNA.

With its enormous information storage capacity, DNA can store not only biological but also digital data. While digital storage systems do this by encoding information in 0's and 1's, DNA does the same using the basic building units adenine, cytosine, guanine and thymine.

The researchers report that the new storage method, which they call T-REX (Thermoset-REinforced Xeropreservation), can preserve DNA at temperatures up to 75 degrees Celsius. And unlike silicon dioxide, such storage takes only a few hours.

Using this method, the researchers stored the DNA encoding of Jurassic Park's theme song, the Declaration of Independence and the MIT logo, and observed that the data was not damaged after removing the DNA.

The researchers are already planning to turn the polymer into capsules for longer-term storage.

Source:

1. Scientists preserve DNA in an amber-like polymer. ( https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2024/06/240613161153.htm )