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DNA Computing:
Technology mimicking nature
Written by Jason Tyson
Since modern
society began to use computers for our everyday lives, we have started
to believe that electronic based computers would be man's most ground
breaking achievement. Now we find that nature is starting to play a significant
role in the digital
revolution: this advancement is known as DNA Computing. DNA Computing
is a new way of solving complicated problems through the combination of
computers and DNA.
Conventional computers
represent information on silicon chips
as a series of electrical impulses and then manipulate that information
by performing mathematical computations. DNA computers represent their
information as a pattern of molecules in artificially created DNA. The
strand of molecules is then exposed to various chemical reactions, which
alter the strand by marking, lengthening or even destroying it.
So
I guess your asking in what ways is this new DNA computer more advanced
that an electronic computer? Well for one, a DNA computer would be able
to solve a problem that would normally take an electronic computer weeks
to solve. An example would be if an average computer had to find the most
efficient schedule for an airliner that served 100 cities, but not all
the cities had non-stop flights, it would take weeks to solve this problem
because the computer would use the process of trial and error. A DNA computer,
on the other hand, tests all the possible solutions simultaneously thus
producing a quicker solution. With this new technology people from all
over the world would be able to do complicated tasks in hours! This would
allow teens, from any school that has access to the DNA technology, to
be able to collect data for lab experiments and other projects in hours
rather than months or years of extensive research.
Over
all I feel that once we have perfected this technology mankind will be
able to infinitely increase our speed in the research and development
of many forms of technology.
For more information on the following topic, please go to: http://dna2z.com/dnacpu/dna.html
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