Slashdot Mirror
Convergence of Biology and Computers?
Pankaj Arora asks: "This summer I am working on both Bioinformatics and Molecular Biology research projects at the Mayo Clinic Rochester. Being an MIS major with a heavy CS background, I've been learning about biochemistry performing polymerase chain reactions (PCRs) and RNA retranslation among other things. I've learned biology works a lot like computers; binary has 1s and 0s, DNA has nucleotides: A, T, C, and G. Binary has 8 bits to a byte, DNA has 3 nucleotides to a codon. Computers and biology seem to have a natural fit; information is encoded and represented 'digitally' in a sense. I was wondering what people thought about the future of biology-based and genetics-based computing due to the immense efficiencies that lie in nature. This has been discussed to an extent here, but there were some specific aspects that I feel are quite important and were not discussed thoroughly, thus I have a few questions to pose to the Slashdot community."
"The aspects I would like discussed are as follows:
- In the long run, will biology rewrite computing or will modern day technology concepts and theory be integrated into biology? If both are true, which will have the greater effect? I understand long run is ambiguous in this question, but Iâ(TM)m interested in all thoughts using any applicable definition.
- Tied to the first question: How will the nature of computing, and how we perceive it, change due to biology integration? More to the point, how much of the theory we learn today may change?
- What will be the biggest issue determining the success of the adoption of biology-integrated computing? Will it be technology factors or will it be societal factors (e.g., rebellion by the Right Wing), or something else? What things must hold true to make the idea succeed?
- And perhaps the hottest issue of all: Is there anything inherently wrong with pursuing this avenue? What may be some of the consequences?
"biology rewrite computing or will modern day technology concepts and theory be integrated into biology"
.eom
Modern day technology concepts and biology will both one day become so advanced that they are are... indistinguishable.
You must be new around here...
If we can finally assimilate that pesky planet at sector 001, then we will consider ourselves to be a success.
Actually, there has already been a large scale integration of biology and computing. You can see a summary of the work here. In fact they've already done a follow up experiment, and I here that there's a third project in the works.
Binary has 8 bits to a byte, DNA has 3 nucleotides to a codon.
I got a big codon while I was reading the linux kernel source.
Compared to war, all other forms of human endeavor shrink to insignificance. God, how I love it. - Gen. George Patton
as a fellow cyborg (glasses/contact lenses) I agree
When I first read your post, I read it as:
binary + DNA = pi
Somehow, I envisioned a future where we all took electric drills to our heads.
-- Fighting mediocrity one bad post at a time.
I for one, look forward to the days when Microsoft try running their wonderful code in my DNA. I mean, imagine all the potential:
"I'm sorry, your DNA has just crashed. You're experiencing the blue goop of death."
Of course, all the geeks would run their DNA on Linux. They'd be capable of doing many things faster, they'd live forever compared to their microsoft bretherin and the vast majority of society would never, ever, want to interact with them. So no change there then.
The ARMY has live soldiers and dead soldiers
Binary has 8 bits to a byte, DNA has 3 nucleotides to a codon.
The ARMY has 8 to 10 soldiers to a squad.
Computers and biology seem to have a natural fit;
The ARMY also seems to fit the computer model using the same criteria. Does that make it a computer?
-- Thou hast strayed far from the path of the Avatar.
Who wants to put some money down on a wager that the first significant merger of biology and computers will be accomplished by the pr0n industry?
"Ask not what your country can do for you." --John F. Kennedy
We already know about the convergence of computing and biology. ;-)
I'd rather be a conservative nutjob than a liberal with no nuts and no job.
You'd better skip it. The evidence from your post is that you don't have the necessary reading comprehension skills.
The other 90% was the hard part, typically requiring running some coke
Typo, or seedy underside of the programming community? You decide!
You do know that we're just part of a 10 billion year computer program on Earth, the greatest computer ever built in space and time, and commissioned by mice?
What will happen is lawyers, marketers and a whole lot of other people who also know little about either will create a monster, ungainly, unkillable, self serving, that will help people in all the advertised ways while hurting them in new unforseeable ways, then a white rap singer turned actor will star in a movie that gets it all wrong.