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DNA Strands Modified Into Tiny Fiber-Optic Cables
holy_calamity writes "New Scientist reports on the latest idea from researchers trying to make microcomputers use photons in place of electrons — to make optical interconnects from strands of DNA. Mixing DNA strands with the right dye molecule upgrades them into wires for light, like microscopic optical fibers, able to absorb photons at one end and transmit them to the other. One of the neat things about using DNA is it is the right scale to play nicely with existing and future chip lithography. Quoting: 'The result is similar to natural photonic wires found inside organisms like algae, where they are used to transport photons to parts of a cell where their energy can be tapped. In these wires, chromophores are lined up in chains to channel photons.'"
Ok great, yeah, give the robots DNA too. Like we'll have any chance now.
c++;
Hmmm...I'm no biologist, but I'll bet it's the right scale for human-implanted computing. Wow. Be afraid...very afraid...
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We had this ability already built into our biology and we instead use chemical signals for our nervous system? It is a pity we didn't have an intelligent designer (one with degrees in electrical engineering and physics).
This of course is not evidence for or against any kind of theology in general, because theology is a much more diverse (and interesting) subject than the Creationists and IDers would have you believe. But it does look as though the question "how did life get started", which is vague and ill defined, is gradually resolving down to the question "under what circumstances can ribose nucleic acids form spontaneously, and how many other small molecules can we find which can spontaneously arrange themselves in the presence of ribose nucleic acids?" which is testable.
From scarped cliff or quarried stone she cries "A thousand types are gone, I care for nothing, no not one."
As I understand it, fiber optic works because there is minimal signal (light) loss due to total internal reflection, which is a consequence of differences in the refractive indices of the glass and the cladding used in the fiber. Does the structure of DNA somehow support reflecting light in the same way? Pretty cool stuff.
I don't think the comparison with optic fibres is valid. This is no reflection phenomenon. The so-called natural optic wires are not reflection based, but rather a series of chromophores chained together. Photon transport is a series of absorption-emission-events channeling the energy down the chain.
The same is most likely the case with this stuff. The light transport is no intrinsic property of the DNA, but rather of chromophores coupled to it. DNA just serves as a scaffold to arrange the absorption-emission centres.
Ofc, build this into a computer and I will show you the true meaning of "virus".... Biochemical hacking, oh yes, I am looking forward to that...
Ubi solitudinem faciunt, pacem appellant.
Thinking fast doesn't mean thinking wisely. We don't have an AI level high enough to put on robots to make the smarter than us.
Am I eval()? - http://www.monst3r.com.br
These modified DNA strands seem to act more like the photosynthetic electron-transport system than they do optical fibers. In fact, one of the applications listed is "light harvesting in artificial photosynthetic systems." It is curious that TFA describes this as a fiber optics corollary.
Fiber optics works based on the principles that photons will reflect off of a surface given a sufficient difference in refractive index and approach angle, allowing high-bandwidth communication. This new DNA photon transport system seems to have very little resemblance. I would guess that using DNA for communication would be very slow and very low bandwidth, to the point of being practically infeasible.
- Demosthenes
cynicsreport.com
1. Use DNA-based fiber-optics in the major backbones of the internet
2. Spread rumor that the DNA comes from fetal stem cells from forcibly aborted babies, white christian babies!
3. Watch right-wingers shut down their sites and flee the internet so they won't be taking part in the satanic evil of telecommunications.
4. Remind them that their phone calls go over that same satanic fiber so they can't use phones, either.
5. Gin up a new rumor that the power lines are being replaced by baby DNA fiber-optics, too, mail that to them in a chain letter.
6. Watch them become the new Amish, shunning baby DNA-based demon technology, spinning their hate into hand-crafted quilts sold by the roadside.
7. ??? Maybe if we're still feeling malicious, convince them buttons use baby DNA, too.
8. Profit!
Kwisatz Haderach
Sell the spice to CHOAM
This Mahdi took Shaddam's Throne
So either we have to believe that the Jehovah's Witnesses and other "fundamentalists" have been supplied with a heavily corrected version of the Hebrew Bible by a God who keeps supplying different versions in different versions of English (King James, Revised etc.) or that they have been misled by a series of incompetent scholars who never bothered to learn Hebrew.
It's strange, is it not, that Roman Catholic and Episcopalian priests (most of whom do know Hebrew) are quite comfortable with the age of the Universe and the Theory of Evolution, and it is the unlettered fundamentalists, who don't know their k'thibh from their qu're, who aren't?
From scarped cliff or quarried stone she cries "A thousand types are gone, I care for nothing, no not one."
The second issue is quite basic. Fundamentalists, to preserve their interpretation against the evidence, have to pretend that the Bible is literally correct. If you preserve an actual mistake - because the word Jehovah is a mistake, not a mispronunciation - you are admitting to your Bible something that is not literally correct. And if you have done that, how many other scribes and copyists may have done the same?
It's OK. Mit der Dummheit kaempfen Goetter selbst vergebens, and I know the battle is unwinnable. I wouldn't have bothered, had not your original post been so ridiculous.
From scarped cliff or quarried stone she cries "A thousand types are gone, I care for nothing, no not one."
Are you kidding? Yeah, it's been done using current technology, but to date there isn't one that isn't some clunky, oversized, borg-looking construction that requires an impractical amount of power. We need a "transitor" of the man-machine interface, something compact, efficient and reliable, and this looks like a step in the right direction.
The brain communicates chemically/electrically. A way to turn DNA strands into optical fiber isn't a step anywhere NEAR the direction of interfacing with the human brain.
If a job's not worth doing, it's not worth doing right.