-- New Storage Technologies Needed to
Address Emerging Data Oceans --
-- Dense, Stable, Low Power Data Storage in
DNA Provides Option to Traditional Storage --
The DNA Data Storage Alliance, an organization of more than 25
leading companies formed by Twist Bioscience Corporation (NASDAQ:
TWST), Illumina, Inc. (NASDAQ: ILMN) and Western Digital (NASDAQ:
WDC) together with Microsoft Research, today announced its first
white paper titled “Preserving our Digital Legacy: An Introduction
to DNA Data Storage.”
This press release features multimedia. View
the full release here:
https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20210610005250/en/
The white paper, which can be found on the newly launched DNA
Data Storage Alliance website, www.dnastoragealliance.org, presents
DNA data storage fundamentals in an accessible way for both
technically curious readers and for IT business, computer science
or electrical engineering readers interested in the benefits, a
technical overview, and the cost of ownership of this potential new
storage medium. It discusses why DNA data storage is needed and
expected to address the exponential growth of digital data.
A recent Gartner reporti estimates that “In 2020, humans likely
generated in excess of 400 ZB of digital ‘stuff’ – equivalent to
400 million petabytes or 400 billion terabytes (or 40 ‘shoeboxes’
of DNA data storage).” Further, “Gartner considers a 35% per-year
growth scenario – closely reflecting the actual growth we saw
beginning in 2010, a year that might be considered the birth of the
cloud storage area – to be most likely.” According to the report,
“new breeds of storage technologies must be created in response to
the emerging need for immense available capacity at minimal cost in
enterprise data centers.”
The density of DNA data storage is unprecedented. If the space
inside an LTO cassette (approximately 235,000 mm3) were filled with
DNA-based bits, the cassette could hold about 2,000,000 TB, or
about 115,000 times the number of bits on an LTO-9 tape. In
addition, encapsulated DNA has been shown to remain stable for
1000’s of years, even in harsh conditions.
“It’s undeniable that data growth is outpacing the scalability
of today’s storage solutions. Literally, everything we do revolves
around data – and capturing, storing, processing and mining it only
serves to create even more data. The density and stability of DNA
storage will help the industry cost-effectively cope with the
expected future growth of archival data for many decades to come,”
said Steffen Hellmold, vice president, corporate strategic
initiatives, Western Digital.
Another key aspect of DNA as a storage medium is the
immutability of its format. With existing storage technologies, the
physical structure and format of the media and the methods used to
read and write to it are fundamentally coupled. In contrast, DNA’s
structure means that any generation of DNA readers and writers will
be able to read and write DNA as long as the bit encoding formats
are saved.
“The method for reading back data – either periodically to check
data quality, or when needed for processing – is critically
important in the life sciences as well as for data storage. Due to
DNA’s universal format, DNA media will always be readable and
writable,” stated Alex Aravanis, M.D., Ph.D., chief technology
officer at Illumina. “We continue to drive sequencing technology
forward at a rapid rate, with new applications like DNA data
storage, and anticipate an active role in this market.”
“In addition to density, stability and eternal relevance, DNA
data storage provides a far more sustainable option, requiring
negligible space and energy when compared to current data centers
that use an ever-growing amount of power and land,” said Emily M.
Leproust, Ph.D., CEO and co-founder of Twist Bioscience. “Taken
together, DNA’s storage density, durability and minimal maintenance
costs radically reduce the cost of maintaining digital data in DNA
over time, making it a viable option for long-term archival data
retention.”
“The intersection of the trend toward massive digital data
storage needs with our ability to manipulate synthetic DNA offers a
vision of data archival ability that could radically change the
scale of what we store and how long we store it,” commented Karin
Strauss, senior principal research manager at Microsoft Research.
“Preserving our digital legacy in turn opens possibilities to
extract, and even create or discover, new knowledge.”
The DNA Data Storage Alliance expects to release additional
white papers detailing use cases and market opportunities and
requirements. If you wish to get involved or just get more
information, please visit our web site, www.dnastoragealliance.org,
or contact the Alliance at info@dnastoragealliance.org.
About the DNA Data Storage Alliance
The DNA Data Storage Alliance was formed in October 2020 by
Illumina, Microsoft Research, Twist Bioscience and Western Digital.
Our mission is to create and promote an interoperable storage
ecosystem based on manufactured DNA as a data storage medium. Our
initial aim is to educate the public and raise awareness about this
emerging technology. In addition, as the methods and tools for
commercially viable DNA data storage become better understood and
more widely available, the Alliance will consider the creation of
specifications and standards (e.g., encoding, physical interfaces,
retention, file systems) to promote the emergence of interoperable
DNA data storage-based solutions that complement existing storage
hierarchies. The Alliance neither certifies nor endorses specific
products or applications. Follow the Alliance on Twitter and
LinkedIn.
i Gartner, ‘Emerging Technologies: New Active/Accessible and
Deep Archive Data Requirements – DNA Data Storage’, John Monroe,
April 23, 2021
View source
version on businesswire.com: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20210610005250/en/
Twist Bioscience: Angela Bitting 925- 202-6211
abitting@twistbioscience.com
Illumina: Dr. Karen Birmingham 1-646-355-2111
kbirmingham@illumina.com
Western Digital Media Contact: Erin Hartin 1-303-601-8035
Erin.Hartin@wdc.com
Investor Contact: T. Peter Andrew +1-949-672-9655
peter.andrew@wdc.com investor@wdc.com
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