Scientists are exploring the feasibility of biological data storage, namely in synthetic DNA. DNA is the oldest storage device in the world, and is one of the most promising ways of solving our data management problems. This new technology has the potential to store all of the world’s data in just 1 kg of DNA. It can last a remarkably long time in the right conditions and the format would never become obsolete. Most tantalizing of all is the possibility that we might be able to genetically modify organisms which sustain themselves such as bacteria, utilising ‘blank space’ in DNA structures to archive data.

But this presents new questions. Could a GMO really become our future solution for data warming? What if we use the DNA of higher-order living organisms, such as animals, humans or plants, to store some of our information? Plants are generous and life-giving organisms, providing habitats, producing food and creating oxygen. They are also extremely mysterious organisms, holding many secrets and possessing unimaginable qualities, many of which make them potentially an excellent candidate to become a new type of living hardware. 

In 2017, Cyrus Clarke and Monika Seyfried created Grow Your Own Cloud (GYOC), initially to investigate the possibilities of DNA data storage to alleviate the threat of Data Warming, and explore futures in which nature is a technology we work with, and data is a material that we can experience in tangible, organic formats.

Our initial research took us from reading OOO philosophy to GMO ethics. We ran workshops with bio-hackers and scientists to get better acquainted with the topics, spending time specifically with plant geneticists at the University of Copenhagen to explore how we might encode plants with data while also investigating the ethical ramifications of such an intervention.

Upon their visit, each visitor received a personal consultation from a data-growth expert, an in-store specialist who guided them through the data-to-DNA-to-plant encoding process, converting uploaded files like JPEGs and mp3s into ACGTs and synthetic DNA.

We designed and developed a set of props such as data prescriptions to explore people’s data requirements, while educating them on the possibilities of using DNA based data storage, such as storage capacity, ultra-longevity and the ability to cross-pollinate or re-plant data.