DNA isn’t just for genetics anymore; it’s shaping up to be the ultimate storage device, especially for your photographs.
Why?
Because it’s tiny but mighty: a single gram of DNA can store massive amounts of data. Also, it lasts for thousands of years. Unlike energy-hungry data centers, DNA doesn’t require constant power.
But there’s a catch. DNA doesn’t use the 1s and 0s of digital code, it uses four building blocks (A, T, C, and G). So, converting digital images into this quaternary code neatly and efficiently is a big challenge. Scientists have to work around the molecule’s natural quirks to avoid errors and keep things readable.
New record for storing digital data in DNA
With over two trillion photos expected to be snapped each year, our digital memories are filling up the cloud fast and straining the planet. DNA storage could be a smarter, greener solution to archive all those pixels for the long haul.
At EPFL, scientists are working on a new way to shrink image files so they can be saved inside DNA, a tiny but powerful storage system. To put its potential into perspective: just 1 gram of DNA could hold about 215 million gigabytes. That’s like squeezing the content of 860,000 hard drives into something smaller than a paperclip.
Thanks to remarkable breakthroughs in biotechnology, scientists can now both read and write the very blueprint of life: DNA.
When it comes to using DNA as data storage, first, digital data (made of 0s and 1s) is converted into DNA code using four letters—A, T, C, and G. Then, this code is turned into real DNA strands in the lab. To retrieve the data, scientists reverse the process, decoding the DNA back into digital files.
Transforming double helix into a robust, sustainable data storage platform
The new compression standard they’re designing helps make this process faster and more efficient, bringing us one step closer to storing your entire photo library inside a droplet of DNA.
The Future of Archiving
Storing data in DNA sounds futuristic, and it is. It could keep our files safe for thousands of years while using barely any energy. But right now, this powerful idea faces two major roadblocks: it’s expensive, and it takes a long time to save and retrieve data.
Still, researchers around the world—including a team led by digital imaging expert Touradj Ebrahimi—are pushing the tech forward. Ebrahimi, who heads the global JPEG committee, is working on a game-changing project called JPEG DNA.
This project, partnered with global institutions like Japan’s Takushoku University, is creating a special image-compression format designed just for DNA. Why? Because storing pictures in DNA isn’t simple, images have to be encoded, turned into real DNA, stored safely, and then decoded with precision.
With a new global standard like JPEG DNA, scientists and engineers hope to make this incredible technology more reliable, accessible, and ready for real-world use.
DNA technology offers suite of data storage and computing functions
To bring DNA storage closer to reality, Ebrahimi and his team designed a smart testing system that evaluates how different DNA-based methods perform. It includes preloaded test images to compare results, benchmarks for quality and speed, error-correction tools to fix glitches, and biochemical guardrails to make sure DNA strands don’t break down from unstable code patterns.
For large multimedia files, they created a new compression algorithm that can efficiently encode binary data into DNA sequences. With .jpg images (no need to decode them first), it produces less synthetic DNA without requiring high processing power and delivers high-quality results.
Working with the official JPEG committee, the EPFL engineers built this into a new standard: JPEG DNA. They also added something called noisy-channel coding, a method to protect the data against biochemical “static” that can happen inside DNA.
And with AI now lending a hand, the team believes they’ll soon make the encoding and error-fixing even sharper, without breaking the rules of the existing format.
The JPEG committee plans to introduce the JPEG DNA international standard in 2026.
References:
- Coding of still pictures. (Link)
- Towards effective visual information storage on DNA support. (Link)
- Enhancing image quality in next-generation image compression. (Link)
