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We often refer to the DNA in our cells as the program, the code of life. Scientists are learning to exploit these characteristics of DNA and to alter them to create “new programs”, as an example to create bacteria that can dissolve an oil spill by digesting the oil decomposing it into degradable components.
Technologies like CRISPR/Cas 9 allow scientists to change the code in the DNA cutting and splicing codons to create desired proteins, reacting to specific conditions.
Now a team of researchers at Austin, University of Texas, have moved the first steps to program DNA molecules to create sophisticated molecular machines.
They observed that robots are artificial entities that can be programmed to execute a specific task. White blood cells, in a way, are also programmed to execute a specific task, like chasing a bacteria and killing it. White blood cells are a sort of “wet robots” and they act through chemical interactions. The researchers invented a molecular programming language and a molecular compiler to create a “molecular hardware”, a wet robot, that can execute specific actions. Take a look at the video clip. It explains really well what they have done.
To demonstrate the capability of programming the DNA the researchers created a chemical oscillator that can take decisions (it is called “rock-paper-scissor oscillator” because it mimics the kind of decisions taken in the game).
The short term goal is to be able to program the DNA to synthesise complex molecules able to detect complex signatures and take actions. The longer term is to apply these programs to fix a malfunctioning circuit in a cells.
