Data Warming
By: Anna Heck
Tags: Biotechnology, Data

Data Warming

Every time you hear that your data is stored on a cloud, you probably think of one of those fluffy, white clouds in the sky. I know that is what I used to think. But, the unfortunate truth is that our data is not stored in a nice white fluffy cloud, but instead in rows of huge computers in data centers. And, not only is this cloud not fluffy and white, but it is also creating a devasting issue for our world. Introducing…data warming. Just because it isn’t talked about doesn’t mean it’s not a major issue.

The reality of data storage and the cloud.

What is Data Warming?

So, what is data warming? Well, first we need to understand that everyday humans produce over 2.5 quintillion bytes of data! That is a lot! Data warming is the issue that we are producing more data than we will ever be able to store. For years, we have always thought that we will be able to keep all the data that we make, especially because of advancements in technology, but it has become clear that it is no longer an option. The technology we have though will never be able to keep up with the amount of data we have, which means soon we are going to have to get rid of it. 😨

Why Is This an Issue?

Now that you know what data warming is, you are probably wondering why this is an issue. I mean, why does it matter if we delete data? We could just delete non-important data, right? Well, it’s not that simple. When we look to the past, we have learned all sorts of things based on what they have left behind. They probably didn’t know that a spoon they made out of a rock, or their broken and rehealed femur bone could help us define civilization. And the same goes for us. We have no idea what will help future generations, so why would we risk deleting anything. Every piece of data we generate might be a clue for a future generation, which is why we need to persevere all of this. But, how do we do it if our technology can’t keep up?

Prediction of data usage from a few years ago. Even though we have advanced more in technology than expected, we have also generated more than expected.

The amount of data we are producing is increasing exponentially, but our technology is not able to keep up.

The Solution

In order to figure out this problem, we have to start thinking unconventionally. Clearly, our current solutions aren’t going to work, so how can we fix this? Reintroducing…DNA!🎉DNA has stored the data for how to create every living thing forever, so why can’t it help us. For us to solve this problem, we needed to look back at the basics, nature. Nature has had an excellent method for data storage for years, and now it is time for us to take a clue from it.

How can we put our digital data into DNA though? Well, our digital data is all composed up of binary code, which is 0’s and 1’s. DNA is composed up of nucleotide bases, A, G, C, and T’s. So, in order to get our digital data into DNA, we convert binary code to nucleotide bases. Each base is equivalent to a specific combination of binary code. For example, A is equal to 00. Once we convert all our binary code to nucleotide bases, we can turn this into DNA through a process called PCR. This process allows us to take a strand of DNA, and program it to become the specific sequence we want. If you want to learn more about this process, you can watch my video here! Now, that we have our data in DNA, we can store it and keep it forever without having to worry about space, since as long as we are alive, we will be able to decode DNA. So, maybe this is one crisis we can handle.