January 23rd, 2013 01:01 PM ET The stuff we’re made of may be
the means by which we store information that we want kept around
long after we're gone. Scientists have developed a technique of
storing information in DNA, the molecule found in living
creatures including humans that contains genetic instructions.
The experiment is discussed in a new study in the journal
Nature. Researchers aren't using DNA from any living organism,
or one that was once alive; instead, they are synthesizing it.
"We’re using DNA here as a chemical molecule of storage. It just
happens to be the same molecule that is used in our bodies as
well," said Ewan Birney, senior author of the study and
geneticist at the United Kingdom's European Bioinformatics
Institute, at a press briefing Tuesday. As long as the DNA is
kept cold, dry and dark, it will last for a long time. Consider
that scientists can sequence DNA from woolly mammoths tens of
thousands of years old that’s preserved by chance. “There must
be some point in time when it’s chea