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Concept
Biological computing
Summary
Biological computers use biologically derived molecules — such as DNA and/or proteins — to perform digital or real computations.
The development of biocomputers has been made possible by the expanding new science of nanobiotechnology. The term nanobiotechnology can be defined in multiple ways; in a more general sense, nanobiotechnology can be defined as any type of technology that uses both nano-scale materials (i.e. materials having characteristic dimensions of 1-100 nanometers) and biologically based materials. A more restrictive definition views nanobiotechnology more specifically as the design and engineering of proteins that can then be assembled into larger, functional structures
The implementation of nanobiotechnology, as defined in this narrower sense, provides scientists with the ability to engineer biomolecular systems specifically so that they interact in a fashion that can ultimately result in the computational functionality of a computer.
Biocomputers use biologically derived materials to perform computational functions. A biocomputer consists of a pathway or series of metabolic pathways involving biological materials that are engineered to behave in a certain manner based upon the conditions (input) of the system. The resulting pathway of reactions that takes place constitutes an output, which is based on the engineering design of the biocomputer and can be interpreted as a form of computational analysis. Three distinguishable types of biocomputers include biochemical computers, biomechanical computers, and bioelectronic computers.
Biochemical computers use the immense variety of feedback loops that are characteristic of biological chemical reactions in order to achieve computational functionality. Feedback loops in biological systems take many forms, and many different factors can provide both positive and negative feedback to a particular biochemical process, causing either an increase in chemical output or a decrease in chemical output, respectively.
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DNA-based nanomaterials are gaining popularity as uniform and programmable bioengineering tools as a result of recent solutions to their weak stability under biological conditions. The DNA nanotechnology platform uniquely allows decoupling of engineering p ...
AMER CHEMICAL SOC2022An Interactive Gameplay to Crowdsource Multiple Sequence Alignment of Genome Sequences: Genenigma
Comparative genomics is a field of research that compares genomes of different organisms to identify common patterns. It is a powerful method used to identify the genetic diseases that cause mutations. Multiple Sequence Alignment (MSA) is an intermediate s ...
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Duncan Alexander, Ulrich Aschauer, Hao Yu
Despite a growing interest in two-dimensional polymers, their rational synthesis remains a challenge. The solution-phase synthesis of a two-dimensional polymer is reported. ADNA-based monomer self-assembles into a supra-molecular network, which is further ...
Wiley-V C H Verlag Gmbh2017Related concepts (2)
Wetware computer
A wetware computer is an organic computer (which can also be known as an artificial organic brain or a neurocomputer) composed of organic material "wetware" such as "living" neurons. Wetware computers composed of neurons are different than conventional computers because they use biological materials, and offer the possibility of substantially more energy-efficient computing. While a wetware computer is still largely conceptual, there has been limited success with construction and prototyping, which has acted as a proof of the concept's realistic application to computing in the future.
DNA computing
DNA computing is an emerging branch of unconventional computing which uses DNA, biochemistry, and molecular biology hardware, instead of the traditional electronic computing. Research and development in this area concerns theory, experiments, and applications of DNA computing. Although the field originally started with the demonstration of a computing application by Len Adleman in 1994, it has now been expanded to several other avenues such as the development of storage technologies, nanoscale imaging modalities, synthetic controllers and reaction networks, etc.