DNA could one day store all the world’s data for a millennium

New York Times : With so much computer data being generated, researchers have been seeking ever better ways of storing the information. Current magnetic and electronic systems aren’t permanent and can only store data for a few decades. Their capacity is also limited to several terabytes of information, and because the tapes and cartridges must be put into storage, retrieving that information can take days. Now researchers say DNA has the potential to store all the information in the world in a volume of just 9 liters for longer than a millennium. Building on previous work in DNA storage, research teams at Microsoft and the Universities of Illinois and Washington have demonstrated not only how information can be stored in DNA but also how specific files can be selected and retrieved. Furthermore, the researchers expect to be able to scale up their work by several orders of magnitude as the costs involved in creating synthetic DNA decrease.