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zrski
zrski
What is the basic similarity between an orange and a floppy disk?
"The answer: They both rely on code. The floppy disk stores
information in ones and zeros. The orange has a different type of
code (the proteins represented by the letters A,T,C,G), but it is a
code nonetheless.
The reason we think of the two as so different is that we can
manipulate the coded information in the floppy disk. But that is
rapidly becoming true for the orange as well. Reading and re-writing
that organic code will cause changes beyond what we can imagine.
Understanding the code would enable you to turn an orange into a
contraceptive, or polyester, or a vaccine.
Sound farfetched? Well, each of these alterations has ALREADY been
achieved in corn. So again, if you don't see the congruence between
orange and floppy disk, you need to open your eyes and see what lies
just around the next turn.
Just as digital code has changed the world we live in, the genetic
code is about to change everything again. Genetics will drive the
next century and become the new dominant language."
-----
[To better appreciate the LARGE amounts of data in the genetic code,
consider this comparison:] "According to a study by the University
of California at Berkeley, the world's media is currently producing
about 1.5 exabytes of data ANNUALLY (including 7.5 quadrillion
minutes worth of telephone conversations; over 600 billion emails;
and 500 billion photocopies in the U.S. alone).
Compare that to all the words spoken by all the human beings
throughout all of history, [which is] estimated at [only] 5
exabytes."
-----
"To put the amount of genetic data YOU posses in perspective,
consider that your genetic code consists of three billion letters.
The code is repeated twice within each cell, and your body has about
50 trillion cells."
[Essentially, YOU walk around carrying 1.5^23 ("15" with 22 zeros
after it, or '150 zettabits') of data. To really appreciate the
magnitude of this number, remember that the sequence goes: Kilo,
Mega, Giga, Tera, Peta, Exa, Zetta, Yotta.]
-----
If you stretched out the DNA contained in one of your cells, it
would measure about six feet long. Inside your cell, it folds into
trillionths of an inch!
-----
"Bioinformatics involves deriving information from the 100 terabytes
of data coming out of genetics labs on an annual basis."
-----
"In the Industrial Revolution, machines enabled people to leverage
their PHYSICAL capacity a hundred- or a thousand- fold.
The new [genetics-based] technologies may allow people to multiply
their MENTAL energies a million or a trillion fold. The world's best
computer minds are now being drawn to the field of biology,
specifically into the fields of bioinformatics and bio-computing."
-----
"All the trends in bioscience point to exponential growth."
Sound tantalizingly like the world of semiconductors? It seems that
semiconductor's and computing's rocket-like growth is about to happen
again (driven in-part BY computing's growth). Same story, different
field. Except that in this new case, we're just at the BEGINNING of its
exponential curve...
Uit de harrow technology rapport
HL-er van het eerste uur (& proud of it)
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